AI_Workflow

The 27 Roles

Every role in the assembly line, what it reads, what it writes, and what it does. This is a reference page — you don’t need to memorize it. Use it when you’re setting up a project’s .claude/roles/ directory or when you’re trying to figure out where a piece of work belongs.

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How roles work

Each role lives as a markdown file at .claude/roles/<role-name>.md. When a worker terminal runs /prime <role>, it loads:

1. CLAUDE.md (project context)
2. .claude/roles/<role-name>.md (this role’s definition)
3. The role-specific inventory file (if any) from .claude/inventories/

The role file describes:

• What this role is responsible for
• What files it reads
• What files it writes
• What it does NOT do (the boundary)
• What other roles it talks to

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Council members (governance)

The council votes on RFCs. Major architectural decisions require council consensus. See rfcs-and-council.md for the voting flow.

Role	Responsibility	Council
CTO	Strategic technical direction	✓
Architect	Structural design decisions	✓
Security	Security audits and policy	✓
Toolsmith	Tooling, scripts, slash commands	✓
DevOps	CI/CD, infrastructure	✓
ProductOwner	Backlog priority, feature scope	✓

These 6 are the council. Quorum: all non-abstaining members must approve for an RFC to pass.

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Strategy stage

Role	Reads	Writes	Does
CTO	Roadmap, RFCs, market signals	Strategic memos, RFCs	Sets technical direction; council member
ProductOwner	Backlog, user feedback	Prioritized backlog, acceptance criteria	Feature prioritization; council member
BusinessAnalyst	Stakeholder requests	Translated requirements docs	Bridges business and engineering

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Design stage

Role	Reads	Writes	Does
Architect	Strategic memos, plan.md files	Architecture RFCs, decisions	Structural design; council member
UXDesigner	User research, personas	UX flow diagrams, journey maps	User experience flows
UIDesigner	UX flows, brand guidelines	Design tokens, component specs	Visual design system

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Wireframes stage

The biggest stage by terminal count. Wireframe generation parallelizes well — see wireframe-pipeline.md.

Role	Reads	Writes	Does
Planner	Spec.md, screen list	Wireframe assignments	Plans which SVGs to generate
Generator1	Assigned wireframe spec	One SVG per task	Generates SVGs (/wireframe)
Generator2	Assigned wireframe spec	One SVG per task	Parallel generator
Generator3	Assigned wireframe spec	One SVG per task	Parallel generator
PreviewHost	SVG files	Viewer container state	Runs the hot-reload viewer
WireframeQA	SVGs, screenshots	*.issues.md files	Reviews SVGs, files issues
Validator	SVGs	Validator output	Runs validate-wireframe.py
Inspector	All SVGs in feature	Inspection report	Cross-SVG consistency check

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Code stage

Role	Reads	Writes	Does
Developer	Spec, plan, tasks, wireframes	Source code, unit tests	Implements features (/speckit.implement)
Toolsmith	Slash commands, scripts	Command files, scripts	Maintains tooling; council member
Security	Source code, dependencies	Security audit reports	Security review; council member

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Test stage

Role	Reads	Writes	Does
TestEngineer	Source code, requirements	E2E tests, integration tests	Writes test suites
QALead	Test results, coverage reports	Sign-off reports	Reviews coverage, signs off releases
Auditor	All artifacts	Formal audit documents	Produces audit deliverables (/audit)

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Docs stage

Role	Reads	Writes	Does
Author	Features, marketing brief	Blog posts, marketing copy	User-facing copy
TechWriter	Source code, API specs	API reference, README, runbooks	Developer-facing docs

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Release stage

Role	Reads	Writes	Does
DevOps	CI logs, infrastructure config	CI/CD configs, deploy scripts	Manages CI/CD; council member
DockerCaptain	Dockerfiles, compose files	Container configs	Owns container infrastructure
ReleaseManager	Test reports, sign-offs	Release notes, version tags	Cuts releases, handles rollbacks
Coordinator	Queue, all worker states	Queue updates	Internal switchboard for workers

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Special role: Operator

Role	Where it runs	Does
Operator	OUTSIDE tmux	Launches sessions, dispatches work, monitors, escalates

The Operator is NOT one of the 27. It’s the meta-terminal that runs the 27. See the-operator.md.

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Roles you might add

These aren’t in TurtleWolfe’s standard 27, but they show up in some projects:

• Translator — multilingual content
• Designer (separate from UX/UI) — for product design that bridges both
• DataEngineer — for projects with significant ETL or analytics
• SREEngineer — for projects with on-call rotations
• Compliance — for regulated industries

When you add a role, give it:

1. A definition file at .claude/roles/<name>.md
2. An inventory file if it needs one
3. A queue dispatcher rule (so the Operator knows when to dispatch to it)
4. A primer command if /prime <name> won’t work out of the box

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Related

• README.md — chapter overview
• the-assembly-line.md — how the roles flow together
• the-operator.md — the meta-orchestrator
• dispatch-and-queue.md — how work moves between roles
• rfcs-and-council.md — how the 6 council members vote

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