---
name: executive-advisory-board-agenda-builder
description: "Builds a minute-by-minute Customer Advisory Board or executive council agenda with strategic discussion blocks, facilitation prompts, pre-read assignments, and a structured feedback-capture plan calibrated to attendee seniority and session length. Use when planning a CAB session, executive council meeting, customer advisory summit, or any structured strategic-input session with senior customer stakeholders."
argument-hint: "[strategic-questions] [session-length]"
allowed-tools: ["Read"]
---

# Executive Advisory Board Agenda Builder

## Purpose
Produce a fully sequenced, time-boxed CAB or executive council agenda that turns a set of strategic questions and product themes into facilitated discussion blocks designed to extract usable input from senior customer stakeholders — solving the common failure mode where high-cost executive sessions drift into status updates and produce no decision-grade insight.

## When to Use
Invoke this skill when the user asks to:
- Build an agenda for a Customer Advisory Board (CAB) meeting
- Plan an executive council or customer advisory summit
- Structure a half-day or full-day strategic input session with senior customers
- Design facilitated discussion blocks around specific product or strategy questions
- Turn a list of strategic questions into a timed, facilitated session flow
- Create a pre-read and feedback-capture plan for an executive program event

## Inputs Required
Before starting, collect:
- **Strategic questions**: The 2–5 questions the company most needs senior customer input on
- **Product/strategy themes**: Roadmap areas, market shifts, or initiatives up for discussion
- **Audience seniority**: Titles attending (e.g., VPs, CIOs, CXOs) and approximate group size
- **Session length**: Total time available (e.g., 90 min, half-day, full-day)
- **Format**: In-person / virtual / hybrid
- **Desired outcomes**: What the company must walk away with (validation, prioritization, objections, net-new ideas)
- **Hosting executives**: Which internal leaders will present or facilitate, if known

If desired outcomes or hosting executives are missing, default to a validation-plus-prioritization goal and assume a product/strategy leader hosts the core discussion blocks; note the assumption.

## Instructions

### Step 1: Confirm Session Math and Block Budget
Establish the time envelope before designing content.
- Reserve **15%** of total time for opening/welcome and **10%** for closing/next-steps.
- Reserve **10–15 min** for a break in any session over 2 hours; two breaks for full-day.
- Allocate the remaining time across discussion blocks. Target **35–50 min per strategic question** — never less than 25, because senior attendees need warm-up time before candid input.
- If the number of strategic questions exceeds the available block time, recommend cutting to the highest-leverage questions rather than compressing each below 25 min.

### Step 2: Sequence the Discussion Blocks Using the Engagement Arc
Order blocks so candor and energy build correctly.
1. **Orientation block** — frame the session, ground rules, and what "good input" looks like. Senior attendees give more when told the company genuinely wants disagreement.
2. **Warm, lower-stakes block first** — open with the theme most attendees have strong opinions on, to establish a talking norm before harder questions.
3. **Highest-stakes strategic question in the second-to-prime slot** (roughly 40–60% into the agenda) — peak attention, post-warm-up candor.
4. **Forward-looking / co-creation block near the end** — let attendees shape what comes next, which raises commitment and satisfaction.
- Avoid placing the most important question last; energy and time pressure degrade quality.

### Step 3: Design Each Discussion Block With a Facilitation Structure
For every strategic question or theme, build the block to this internal shape:
- **Block title** and **time box** (start–end on the clock).
- **Framing (3–5 min)**: How the internal host introduces the question — including the specific decision this input will feed and any constraints attendees should know.
- **Facilitation method**: Choose one and justify it by audience size — small group (≤8) use open round-robin; mid group (9–15) use structured prompt + go-around; large group (16+) use breakout pairs reporting back or live polling first to surface dissent.
- **3 primary facilitation prompts**: Open, specific, non-leading questions written in plain language. Include at least one "where are we wrong?" challenge prompt per high-stakes block.
- **Probe prompts (2)**: Follow-ups to deepen thin answers ("What would have to be true for that to change?" / "Who internally would block this and why?").
- **Capture instruction**: What the scribe records — decisions requested, dissent, ranked priorities, or verbatim quotes.

### Step 4: Build the Pre-Read Package
Specify what attendees receive in advance so live time is for input, not briefing.
- **Send timing**: 5–7 business days before the session.
- **Length cap**: No more than 4 pages or a 6-slide deck — executives won't read more.
- **Contents**: The strategic questions verbatim, one-paragraph context per theme, any data/roadmap visuals needed to react, and a single explicit ask ("Come prepared to react to questions 2 and 4").
- Flag any block whose quality depends on the pre-read being completed.

### Step 5: Build the Feedback-Capture and Synthesis Plan
Define how raw input becomes decision-grade output.
- **Live capture roles**: Assign a dedicated scribe per discussion block (not the facilitator).
- **Capture template fields**: Question → Key themes → Points of disagreement → Ranked priorities → Direct quotes → Follow-up commitments.
- **Same-day debrief**: 30-min internal huddle within 24 hours to lock the top 3 takeaways while memory is fresh.
- **Closeout to attendees**: A "you said / we will" recap sent within 10 business days — the single biggest driver of repeat CAB participation.

### Step 6: Assemble the Run-of-Show
Produce the final agenda as a clock-based run-of-show table covering every minute, plus the supporting plans from Steps 4–5.

## Output Format
- **Structure**: Clock-based run-of-show table for the full session, followed by an expanded facilitation detail section per discussion block, followed by the pre-read package spec and the feedback-capture plan
- **Length**: 1,000–1,500 words
- **Format**: Run-of-show as a table (Time | Block | Owner | Method | Output); facilitation details and prompts as structured bullets; pre-read and capture plans as bulleted specs
- **Sections**: Session summary (length, format, goals) → Run-of-show table → Per-block facilitation detail → Pre-read package → Feedback-capture & synthesis plan
- **Tone**: Executive programs lead — precise, time-disciplined, designed for real-room facilitation, not aspirational

## Quality Checklist
Before delivering output, verify:
- [ ] Every minute of the stated session length is accounted for in the run-of-show (block times sum to total time)
- [ ] Each strategic question gets at least 25 minutes of dedicated block time
- [ ] Every discussion block includes 3 primary prompts plus 2 probe prompts written specifically — not generic placeholders
- [ ] The highest-stakes question is placed in the engagement-arc prime slot, not last
- [ ] At least one challenge/"where are we wrong" prompt appears in the high-stakes blocks
- [ ] The feedback-capture plan names a per-block scribe and a closeout timeline to attendees

## Notes
- The fastest way to ruin a CAB is treating it as a roadmap presentation; if the agenda has more company talk-time than customer talk-time, rebalance toward facilitated discussion.
- For mixed-seniority rooms, the most senior voice often anchors the discussion — use breakout pairs or anonymous polling first when you need honest dissent from a CXO-heavy group.
- The "you said / we will" closeout is what converts a one-time session into a standing advisory relationship; never skip it even when input was inconclusive.

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## How to use this skill

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