Pre Commitment Capacity Check

Pre-Commitment Capacity Check

Reconcile a proposed commitment against the user's real workload — calendar, sent email, and Teams — before they say yes. Output is a recommendation with named tradeoffs, not a binary verdict.

When to Use

Trigger when the user is evaluating whether to take on something new: a SOW, proposal, project, client engagement, or any ask. The user may reference a document, or may just be asking generally ("good time to add something?").

When NOT to Use

• Routine weekly calendar review → calendar-management
• Scheduling a single meeting → schedule-meeting
• Daily/morning workload overview → daily-briefing
• Already-committed projects needing rebalancing → answer directly
• Capacity for someone else → answer directly with a manual lookup

Workflow

Step 1 — Locate and read the engagement document (if one exists)

If the user references a SOW, proposal, or estimate, find it:

1. Glob input/**/* for uploaded files
2. SearchM365 with the project/client name + "SOW" or "estimate"
3. Ask if not found

Read with ReadFileContent (SharePoint/OneDrive) or Read (local). Extract binary office files via python-docx (docx), openpyxl (xlsx), or the pdf skill. Pull the estimate/launchpad workbook separately if it exists — that's where roles and per-activity hours usually live.

From the document, capture:

• Total hours, total investment, elapsed duration
• Phases/epics with per-phase hours
• Roles required — note which role(s) the user would fill
• Deliverables per phase
• Scope inclusions and explicit exclusions

Scope-framing check (critical): Compare the user's casual description to the SOW's actual scope. Flag mismatches explicitly — e.g., user says "redesign" but SOW says "narrative refinement" and excludes rebranding.

If no document is referenced, skip the SOW extraction and proceed to the workload sweep — the user is asking a general capacity question.

Step 2 — Calendar sweep (next 30 days)

Call ListCalendarView from today through today + 30 days (or today + elapsed_weeks + 1 buffer week if a SOW window is known). Use select=subject,start,end,isOrganizer,showAs,isAllDay. Set top=200.

Classify every event:

Identify full weeks blocked (OOF or travel spanning Mon–Fri).

Step 3 — Sent-email sweep (last two weeks)

Call ListMessages(folder_id="sentitems", received_after=<14 days ago>, top=100). Scan subject + body for explicit commitment phrases:

• "I'll handle", "I'll send", "I'll review", "I'll get back to you"
• "I'll have this by", "I can deliver", "I'll own this"
• "By [date]", "before [date]"
• "Send you a draft", "follow up with you"

For each match, capture the recipient, subject, and what was promised. These are committed work the calendar may not show.

Step 4 — Teams sweep (recent chats)

Call ListChats(top=20) and for chats with recent activity, pull messages via ListChatMessages(person=<other>, since=<10 days ago>, top=20). Look for:

• Open asks directed at the user ("can you...", "would you mind...")
• In-progress discussions likely to convert to work (proposals being shaped, problems escalating)
• Unanswered questions to the user

These are likely incoming work — not yet committed but trending toward it.

Step 5 — Compute capacity vs. requirement

For each week in the window:

• Blocked weeks (OOF/travel Mon–Fri): subtract entirely
• Partial weeks: ~25h/week deep-work capacity, deduct daily focus blocks and recurring meetings
• Sum → available hours

If a SOW is in play: compare to required hours and match phases to available windows. Heavy drafting needs contiguous blocks; coaching/discovery phases fit around meetings.

Step 6 — Recommend

Lead with one of three recommendations, calibrated per deep-reasoning:

1. Take it on solo / good time to add something — capacity ≥ 1.3× required, no critical-phase week blocks, scope matches strengths
2. Take it on with a partner or role split — capacity exists but elapsed timeline collides with travel; name which role to delegate and which phase fits which window
3. Decline or defer / not a good time — required hours > available, or critical phases fall inside blocked weeks, or sent-email/Teams sweep shows the next two weeks are already over-committed

State confidence (0–100). Below 75 → flag what would change it.

Step 7 — Output format

Concise. Use this structure:

**Recommendation (confidence ~N):** [one-line verdict — good time to add /
take solo / partner-split / not a good time]

**Scope reality check** *(if SOW referenced):* [flag framing mismatch]

**Engagement** *(if SOW referenced):* Xh / $Y / ~Z weeks. Phases: [list].

**Current obligation load:**
- *Committed:* [calendar weeks blocked + sent-email promises with dates]
- *Likely incoming:* [Teams open asks + in-progress threads]

**High-capacity weeks:** [specific week-of dates already at/over capacity]

**Suggested split** *(if applicable):* [role/phase fit per available window]

Every line should be specific to this user's actual data — no generic advice.

Guardrails

• Never guess hours or scope — if SOW unreadable, ask before recommending
• Travel/OOF beats optimism — blocked weeks cannot host deep work
• Daily focus blocks are real — treat as committed
• Surface scope mismatch before the capacity math — wrong scope framing makes the capacity answer meaningless
• Confidence below 75 → state what's missing rather than asserting
• Sent-email commitments count as work — even if not on the calendar
• Teams in-progress threads are signal, not noise — flag them

Anti-Patterns

• Generic "you're busy but it could work" answers
• Counting tentative invites as busy time (they're optional)
• Skipping the scope-framing check and going straight to hours
• Recommending without naming specific weeks/dates
• Ignoring sent-email promises because they aren't on the calendar
• Treating the SOW's elapsed-duration estimate as a hard fact when the user has OOF weeks inside it