TD
Technical Debt Register
🟢 Production-Ready🕐 updated 2026-07-14
🔷 SkillSpec L3
pm-engineering
Document and prioritize a technical debt backlog with business impact, effort estimates, and resolution strategy. Use when asked to audit technical debt, create a debt register, prioritize tech debt for a quarter, document architectural shortcuts, or build a debt reduction roadmap. Produces a structured technical debt register covering debt inventory by category, business impact per item, effort and priority scores, top-item resolution plans, and a quarterly debt reduction roadmap.
What to give it
▸Team or service name — what team and/or service this register covers
▸Known debt items — list of known technical debt, or ask Claude to elicit them by asking about: legacy code, missing tests, outdated dependencies, architectural shortcuts, manual processes, observability gaps, security backlogs
▸Tech stack — language, frameworks, infrastructure (helps Claude categorise and score items correctly)
▸Team size and velocity — number of engineers and approximate story points or days per sprint (needed for effort estimates)
▸Current quarter / planning period — so the roadmap targets the right timeframe
✅ The bar it holds itself to
Every skill in this library self-verifies — these are this skill's own quality checks, straight from its definition.
✓Every item has a named owner — no unowned debt
✓Priority scores are calculated using the formula, not assigned arbitrarily
✓Security and dependency items are not scored below their actual business impact because they feel "technical"
✓Top-5 resolution plans include specific, ticketable steps — not vague descriptions like "improve test coverage"
✓The quarterly roadmap allocates realistic capacity — debt allocation does not exceed actual sprint budget
✓Accepted/deferred items have a review date and a named owner — no permanently deferred items
✓The register distinguishes between debt (deliberate or accumulated shortcuts) and bugs (unintended defects)
✓Items are closed as resolved only when acceptance criteria are met — not when the PR is merged
⚠️ What it refuses to do
Do not score debt items arbitrarily — priority scores must be calculated using the documented formula
Do not conflate technical debt (deliberate shortcuts) with bugs (unintended defects) — they require different remediation strategies
Do not underrate security and dependency items because they feel abstract — score based on actual business impact
Do not create "permanently deferred" items — every accepted item must have a review date and named owner
Do not include resolution plans that are vague descriptions — each plan must have specific, ticketable steps
Install
npx pm-claude-skills add --agent claude # or codex · cursor · gemini · hermes
# or one-line MCP (every skill, any client):
claude mcp add pm-skills -- npx -y pm-claude-skills-mcpStart with
Related skills
🔌 Embed this skill
Drop this on your blog, docs, or site — it renders a "Run this skill" card:
<div data-pm-skill="technical-debt-register"></div>
<script src="https://mohitagw15856.github.io/pm-claude-skills/embed.js" async></script>💬 Discussion
Technical Debt Register is one of 1174 open-source professional AI agent skills — all SkillSpec L3.
Try them all in the browser · ⭐ Star on GitHub · Browse the full catalog