Proxies: simulated stakeholder reviews in Claude Code

A simulated room of stakeholders you run an idea, prototype, or design concept past before the real meeting. Each person has a card: role, incentives, hard lines, blind spots, voice. You give them a flow, spec, or prototype, and each one tells you where it breaks for them.

Proxies are simulations. They show the concerns a role would likely raise. They do not predict what a real person says.

Why not just ask for five personas in one prompt

• Each person runs as a separate agent that sees only their own card, so they don't blur into one agreeable voice.
• The people are saved and reused, and you can correct them against what the real person said.
• They review against the real spec and decision docs, not a stale draft.
• Formats force an outcome: blind positions, then rebuttals, then a decision, with the dissent recorded.
• Every run lands on one results page: who blocks, what's critical, what fixes it. See The results page.

Setup

You need Node 22 or later and Claude Code. There is nothing to install.

git clone https://github.com/rgourley/proxies.git
cd proxies
claude

Claude Code loads the /proxies skill and the persona agent from .claude/ when it starts in this folder. Start a new session after you clone or pull, so it picks up changes to either. Then run /proxies use tilt to check that it works.

Commands

Run from this folder in Claude Code. Full details live in .claude/skills/proxies/SKILL.md.

Command	What it does
/proxies use	Pick the org and list its people
/proxies redteam ""	Everyone tries to break it
/proxies meeting ""	Debate, then the decision owner calls it
/proxies prep	Each person's top questions
/proxies followup	Check whether a revision answered their objections
/proxies compare	Each person picks a version
/proxies ask "" / talk	Talk to one person
/proxies calibrate	Tune a card against what the real person said
/proxies org new ""	Create an org
/proxies new	Add a person to the active org
/proxies clone --to	Copy a person into another org and adapt them
/proxies export / import	Share an org as one JSON file
/proxies pages	Rebuild and republish the results page

Flags for the run commands:

Flag	What it does
--org	Use this org instead of the active one
--use	Invite only the people whose uses list has this use case
--with a,b,c	Invite exactly these people. Overrides --use
--dissenter	This person holds their position unless someone answers their block
--no-decision	End a meeting after the rebuttals, with no decision round
--wordy	Drop the word targets, so each person writes at full length
--noui	Show the results in chat and do not open the page

After a run, the results page opens by default. Chat shows only the verdict and the run folder.

All feedback is in plain business English.

Making your own org and people

Describe the company, and Claude drafts the org:

/proxies org new acme "Mid-size insurer, 4,000 staff, buying a claims tool. Regulated by state insurance boards. IT and compliance can veto vendors."

It writes orgs/acme/org.md: the business, rules, culture, who decides what, and the company's vocabulary. Anything it guessed is marked "(assumed)", and you see the draft before it saves.

Then add people one at a time. Each gets a handle and a seat, which is the role template they start from:

/proxies use acme
/proxies new dana compliance

Claude asks for the name and title and drafts the rest. The seats live in seats/, and you can add your own. /proxies clone dana --to acme adapts a person from another org.

Each person has a decision level: owner decides, veto can block, approve must sign off, consult gives input, and inform is kept in the loop. Everything is plain markdown, so you can also edit the files by hand. Copy orgs/tilt/ to start.

When the real person would have said something different, run /proxies calibrate dana "what they actually said". Claude proposes edits to their file and logs the change.

Each person gets a generated avatar in the style of the Proxies illustration. Their pronouns choose the hair and clothes, and the same person always gets the same avatar. To set it yourself, add any of these to the person file: avatar_hair (bob, bun, ponytail, long, short, curls, scarf, side, buzz, bald, receding, quiff), avatar_top (blazer, suit, turtleneck, vneck, dress), avatar_facial_hair (none, beard, mustache, stubble), and avatar_glasses (none, round, square). To get a different random avatar, add avatar_seed with any text.

The results page

The page opens on its own after every run. To build and open it by hand:

npm run pages
open runs.html

Each run shows who blocks, the ranked findings, what to fix first, and every person's full response. Click any name to open that person's card. npm run pages -- --org tilt builds a page with one org. /proxies pages republishes it as a private Claude artifact that you share from its Share menu.

Sharing an org

An org exports to one JSON file with its people, their calibration logs, and the seats they use:

npm run export-org -- tilt
npm run import-org -- tilt.proxies.json

In Claude Code, use /proxies export tilt and /proxies import tilt.proxies.json. The page's Export button copies the same JSON, and /proxies import with no file reads it from the clipboard on macOS.

The import never overwrites an existing org. Add --as to import it under another name. If a seat differs from your copy, the import stops and names it.

Sample orgs

Three fictional orgs ship with the repo so you can try it right away. tilt is a SaaS company that makes a project planning tool. brightpath is a 14-site clinic network. northpine is a game studio that runs one live game and is building its next one. They hold people only. You bring the thing to review:

/proxies use tilt
/proxies redteam path/to/your-flow.mmd "an agency invites 30 client reviewers"

Git does not keep a client org out of the repo by default. List client orgs, briefs, and runs in .git/info/exclude. That file stays on your machine and is never pushed:

orgs/acme/
briefs/acme/
runs/*acme*/

Layout

seats/                  role templates that every org reuses
orgs//org.md       company context: regulators, culture, decision rights, vocabulary
orgs//people/      one file per person; frontmatter feeds the card
orgs//calibration/ one log per person: real quotes, misses, and the edits they caused
formats/                rules for each command: meeting, redteam, prep, followup, compare, ask/talk, calibrate
briefs//       shared project context: brief.md plus the real source docs every proxy reads
runs/                   one folder per run, with every proxy's output
.claude/agents/         the persona runner (one person per subagent)
.claude/skills/proxies/ the orchestrator

A person file names its seat. The runner gets the seat file, then org.md, then the person file.

License

PolyForm Shield 1.0.0. You can use, change, and share Proxies for any purpose, including inside your company, except to build a product that competes with it. Versions published before this change keep the FSL-1.1-MIT license they shipped with.