Premortem

This is Gary Klein's premortem technique adapted for code review and planning. You run it before implementation to surface failure modes you'd normally only spot after things break. It forces you through a structured checklist of technical risks (scalability, dependencies, security) and then categorizes findings as tigers (real threats), paper tigers (look scary but fine), or elephants (things nobody wants to discuss). The verification requirements are strict: you can't flag a tiger without proving you checked for existing mitigations in the surrounding code. Works in quick mode for PRs or deep mode for pre-implementation reviews. It blocks with an interactive prompt so you have to either accept the risks, add mitigations to your plan, or research solutions before moving forward.

skills.sh installs: 902
GitHub stars: 3.9K
last updated: Aug 21, 2026

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Install

$ npx -y skills add parcadei/continuous-claude-v3 --skill premortem --agent claude-code

Installs into .claude/skills of the current project.

Files

Pre-Mortem

Identify failure modes before they occur by systematically questioning plans, designs, and implementations. Based on Gary Klein's technique, popularized by Shreyas Doshi (Stripe).

Usage

/premortem              # Auto-detect context, choose depth
/premortem quick        # Force quick analysis (plans, PRs)
/premortem deep         # Force deep analysis (before implementation)
/premortem <file>       # Analyze specific plan or code

Core Concept

"Imagine it's 3 months from now and this project has failed spectacularly. Why did it fail?"

Risk Categories (Shreyas Framework)

Category	Symbol	Meaning
Tiger	`[TIGER]`	Clear threat that will hurt us if not addressed
Paper Tiger	`[PAPER]`	Looks threatening but probably fine
Elephant	`[ELEPHANT]`	Thing nobody wants to talk about