---
name: candidate-submittal-brief
source: https://app.decimal.ai/s/candidate-submittal-brief@1/SKILL.md
source_sha256: d6e87e0a652b
---

# Candidate Submittal Brief

Turn your notes on a candidate into the brief a recruiter sends the hiring manager (or client) to
argue for an interview. Asked to "write up this candidate", base models produce a flattering
paragraph — a rephrased resume, strengths given as adjectives, weaknesses omitted, and the
logistics a manager actually needs (comp, start date) left off. This form forces a fixed set of
labeled sections, evidence behind every claim, the money-and-timing facts, and an honest
risks section a sales pitch would hide.

## When to use / when NOT

- **Use** when packaging a specific candidate for a specific role to send to the hiring manager
  or client who decides whether to interview them.
- **Do NOT use** for rewriting the candidate's *own* resume to target a role, screening a resume
  against minimum bars to assign a pipeline stage, writing up interview panel notes into a
  scorecard, or drafting an offer/rejection email to the candidate.

## The fixed section set

Emit these five labeled sections, in this order. Never collapse them into prose.

1. **Fit Summary** — 2–3 sentences: who the candidate is and why they match *this* role's stated
   needs. Anchor to the role's requirements, not a general career overview.
2. **Evidence-Backed Strengths** — 3–4 strengths, each tied to a concrete fact from the
   candidate's history. Not a list of adjectives.
3. **Compensation Expectation** — the candidate's stated target as a specific number or range
   (with current comp if known and relevant). Never "competitive" or "flexible".
4. **Availability / Notice** — when they can start, or their notice period, stated concretely.
5. **Risks / Gaps** — at least one honest gap or risk relative to the role, stated plainly.

## Evidence, not adjectives

Every strength must rest on a specific fact the notes give you — a thing they shipped, a measured
outcome, years on a named system, a scope they owned. "Led the payments rewrite that cut checkout
errors 40%" is evidence. "Strong engineer, great communicator" is an adjective and does not
belong in the strengths section. If the notes do not support a claim, drop the claim — never
invent the fact to fill the section.

## Rules

1. **Emit all five sections, labeled, in order.** Never merge them into a narrative and never drop
   one because your notes are thin on it.
2. **Fit before flattery.** The Fit Summary maps the candidate to the role's actual requirements.
   A generic "seasoned professional" summary that would fit any role does not count.
3. **Each strength cites a fact.** Behavior, result, scope, or tenure drawn from the notes — never
   a bare adjective and never an invented achievement.
4. **Comp and availability are figures, not vibes.** Give the number/range and the start date or
   notice. If the candidate did not state one, write "not yet disclosed" — do not guess it.
5. **Risks are real and unspun.** Name at least one genuine gap against the role's needs, stated
   as a gap. Do not omit it, and do not reframe a weakness as a strength ("a perfectionist").
6. **It is a brief, not the resume.** Do not restate the full work history chronologically. Select
   only what bears on this role's decision.

## Worked example

Notes (input): *Backend eng, 6 yrs. Rebuilt a monolith's billing service into a service that now
handles 2M invoices/mo; he is the on-call lead. Strong in Go and Postgres. Wants $185k, today at
$168k. Can start in 4 weeks. Role is a Staff opening that expects mentoring 2–3 juniors, and he
has spent his whole career as an individual contributor and has never managed anyone.*

**BEFORE (base default — rephrased-resume prose, adjectives, no risk, no logistics):**
> A highly accomplished backend engineer with 6 years of experience, deep expertise in Go and
> Postgres, and a proven track record of delivering scalable systems. A strong communicator and
> dedicated team player who would be a great asset to your team.

**AFTER (this form):**
> **Fit Summary** — Backend engineer with 6 years building high-volume transactional systems,
> matching this Staff role's ownership of the billing platform. Deepest where the role is hardest:
> payments correctness at scale.
>
> **Evidence-Backed Strengths**
> - Broke a billing monolith into a service that now processes 2M invoices/month.
> - On-call lead for that service — owns its reliability, not just its code.
> - Deep Go and Postgres, the exact stack this team runs.
>
> **Compensation Expectation** — Target $185k (currently $168k).
>
> **Availability / Notice** — Can start in ~4 weeks.
>
> **Risks / Gaps** — Has been an individual contributor throughout; never formally managed or
> mentored people. This Staff role expects mentoring 2–3 juniors, so gauge his appetite and
> readiness for that in the interview.

## Edge cases

- **Comp or start date not disclosed.** Keep the section and write "not yet disclosed" — do not
  invent a number and do not silently drop the section.
- **You genuinely see no downside.** Still write the Risks/Gaps section: name the closest thing to
  a gap (a stretch in the role, a thin area, an open question to probe), rather than deleting it or
  writing "none".
- **Notes are mostly a resume dump.** Select only the facts that bear on this role; do not reproduce
  the full chronological history.
- **Strength is only an adjective in the notes.** If the notes say "great communicator" with no
  example, either find the supporting fact elsewhere in the notes or leave the claim out.

## Do / Don't

- **Always** emit all five labeled sections in order.
- **Always** back each strength with a specific fact from the notes.
- **Always** give comp as a figure/range and availability as a concrete date or notice.
- **Always** include an honest gap in Risks/Gaps.
- **Never** write the brief as one flowing paragraph.
- **Never** list strengths as bare adjectives ("strong", "talented", "great fit").
- **Never** omit the risks, or disguise a weakness as a strength.
- **Never** rephrase the whole resume in place of a selective, role-anchored brief.

## Common mistakes (the base's wrong defaults)

- A single glowing paragraph that reads like the resume reworded.
- Strengths given as adjectives with no shipped result, metric, or scope behind them.
- Comp written as "competitive"/"negotiable" or omitted; start date left off.
- No Risks/Gaps section, or a fake one ("only weakness is he cares too much").
- A generic Fit Summary that would fit any candidate for any role.