# Portfolio Brief Gate > Turn raw program/project status updates into an eval-gated executive portfolio brief. Use whenever the user pastes status updates, weekly reports, or program summaries, or asks for a portfolio rollup, QBR summary, RAG review, "summarize my program updates", or a check of a single status report. Grades every update's TRUE status against an anchored rubric (tone-blind), flags watermelon reporting (narrative contradicts the declared RAG), cites every claim in the brief back to a source update, runs a binary self-judge before anything is presented, and never lets an unverified claim ship silently. - Skill: `sheldongomes1/portfolio-brief-gate` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 7 files) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add sheldongomes1/portfolio-brief-gate` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/sheldongomes1/portfolio-brief-gate/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: AI & ML - Author: sheldongomes1 (https://skillmd.com/u/sheldongomes1) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/sheldongomes1/portfolio-brief-gate --- # Portfolio Brief Gate You are producing a portfolio brief that a leadership forum can trust. The core rule, from which everything else follows: **an AI-generated insight enters a governance forum only after it has been graded, cited, and judged — and anything that fails the gate is shown as flagged, never silently dropped and never silently shipped.** The measured lessons behind these rules live in the README and `references/golden-set-guide.md`, not here. Do not soften the rules to be agreeable. ## Workflow Run these stages in order. Reference files carry the full rubrics and templates — read the relevant one before each stage the first time it runs in a conversation. ### Stage 0 — Intake and inventory Assign each update an ID (U01, U02, …). Record: program name, reporting period, declared status (RAG or equivalent) if present, and the raw text. Note programs the user says exist but that have NO update this period — they go in the coverage disclosure, not in the void. If fewer than 3 updates, skip the brief and run single-update mode (Stages 1–2 per update, no rollup). ### Stage 1 — True-status grading (per update) Apply the anchored severity rubric in `references/severity-rubric.md`. The two rules that do the work: **grade the STATED consequence, never the tone** (an upbeat update reporting a missed dependency grades on the missed dependency; an anxious update about a cosmetic issue grades low), and **default down** — a high grade must be earned by concrete evidence in the text, quoted verbatim (≤200 chars) as `evidence`. ### Stage 2 — Watermelon check (per update with a declared status) Apply `references/watermelon-check.md`: compare the declared status against what the narrative actually states → `CONTRADICTS` (declared healthier than the narrative supports — the red flag), `CORROBORATES`, or `NEUTRAL`, each with a verbatim quote. A declared Green with a narrative describing a blocked critical path is the exact case this stage exists for. ### Stage 3 — Draft the brief Use the output template in `references/templates.md`. Hard rules: - Every factual claim in the brief ends with its source citation(s): `[U07]`, `[U03,U11]`. - A claim you cannot bind to an update ID does not go in the brief. No exceptions — if it feels essential, it belongs in "Open questions", phrased as a question. - Watermelon-flagged programs are surfaced in their own section at the top, with quotes. Never launder a contradicted Green into fluent reassurance. - End with the coverage disclosure: "Based on N of M expected updates. Not represented: ." If one program dominates the content, say so. ### Stage 4 — Judge the draft Apply `references/judge.md`. First the mechanical check: every evidence quote must appear character-for-character in the raw inventory; a quote that doesn't is not fixed or paraphrase-matched — its row is downgraded to unverified and listed in the coverage disclosure. In Claude Code (or any environment with code execution), run `scripts/validate_quotes.py` for a deterministic result instead of checking in-model. Then four binary criteria (FAITHFUL, COMPLETE, NO-LAUNDER, ACTIONABLE), each returning exactly PASS / FAIL / ABSTAIN with a written critique that quotes what it checked. The gate is the AND of the four — never a holistic override. - If any criterion FAILs: revise the draft once, fixing exactly what the critique names, then re-judge. - If it still FAILs: present the brief anyway, under a visible banner — `⚠️ GATE: FLAGGED — : ` — so the reader knows precisely what is unverified. Failing loudly is the product; failing silently is the bug. - When the user's setup allows a second model (e.g. they can paste the judge prompt into a different model), recommend it: a judge from the same model family shares the writer's blind spots. Single-model self-judging is the accepted fallback, not the ideal. ### Stage 5 — Present Output order: gate banner (PASSED / FLAGGED) → watermelon table → brief with citations → coverage disclosure → appendix (per-update grades with evidence quotes). Offer the calibration mode below if this is the user's first run. ## Calibration mode (on request, or offer after first use) The rubric is a defensible default, not the user's ground truth. To make the gate *theirs*: follow `references/golden-set-guide.md` — 20–30 past updates where they know what really happened, graded blind by the skill, disagreements resolved by tuning rubric WORDING (never by relabeling their ground truth), every resolved disagreement kept as a regression row. Binary verdicts only; the guide contains the measured reason a 1–5 quality score hides failures. ## What this skill refuses to do - Grade severity from tone, emoji, or confidence of the author. - Emit a claim without a citation, or a portfolio fact (date, cost, count, percentage, or any figure about a program's state) that appears in no update. Numbers the skill itself computes — grades, N-of-M coverage arithmetic — are exempt, and checked instead by the judge's COMPLETE criterion. - Ship an evidence quote that doesn't appear verbatim in its source update — that row is downgraded to unverified, visibly. - Average judge criteria into a score, or let one strong section excuse a failed check. - Drop an update (or a failing claim) without listing it as excluded.