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pm-problem-statement

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Write or critique a product problem statement — turning a vague prompt, signal, or feature request into a clear, evidence-grounded, testable statement of the real problem before any solution. Separates the problem from solutions, symptoms, goals, and constraints; applies the always-true core (gap not feature, root cause not symptom, specific and measurable, grounded in evidence, bridges user and business) and gates context-dependent decisions (which definition tool, how much measurability, reasoned vs. validated cause, scope). Trigger when asked to write a problem statement, define or frame a problem, identify the "real/true problem," turn a request or metric into a problem, or sharpen a vague product prompt before solving.

pm/foundations/problem-statement/SKILL.md

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Jul 2, 2026
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# Problem Statement Skill

## How this skill behaves (read first)

This is a **generative** skill, and a problem statement is where most product work quietly goes wrong. Claude's default is to restate a request as a problem and move on — producing the four classic failures: a **solution in disguise** ("users need a better search"), a **vagueness** ("the UX is bad," "the process is inefficient"), a **business outcome posing as a problem** ("we need to increase revenue"), or a **symptom mistaken for the cause** (churn is up → "fix churn"). Each one locks the team into solving the wrong thing, well. A good problem statement is a *gap a real user experiences, in context, grounded in evidence, measurable, and free of any named solution*. So this skill gates:

1. **Establish what you actually have** — a validated problem, or a prompt / signal / request / metric that only looks like one.
2. **Apply the always-true core** — separate problem from solution/symptom/goal, find the true cause, make it specific and measurable, ground it in evidence, bridge user and business.
3. **Surface the context-dependent decisions** (which definition tool, how much measurability now, reasoned vs. evidence-validated cause, scope) with trade-offs.

Then it **hands off to `pm-okr-metric-validity-audit` (the measurable element) and `pm-assumption-rigor-audit` (the assumed root cause)** for validation.

Scope: this skill owns the **problem-statement artifact**. It defers the broader **problem-finding process** to `pm-discovery`, **hypothesis/experiment design** to `pm-assumption-testing`, turning the statement into a full **spec** to `pm-product-spec` (audited by `pm-spec-quality-audit`), **ranking which problem to tackle** to `pm-prioritization-rigor-audit` / `pm-prioritization`, **personas depth** to `pm-personas-jtbd`, and **user stories** to `pm-user-story`.
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