An open working convention
Your way of working.
Written down.
A team's working rules and its record of what it decided and promised, in plain files the team owns.
How the work is done.
WORKMETHOD.md sets out the rules for a folder, who owns them, and which decisions belong to which people.
What actually happened.
A record/ folder holds dated, attributed entries for decisions and commitments. Each entry is written once and kept.
Questions & answers
Why add WORKMETHOD.md?
Skills, MCP and AGENTS.md help agents do useful work. A team also needs to agree how its work is governed and what it keeps on record.
Why aren't skills enough on their own?
Skills package instructions and resources for a task. A skill might explain how to review a contract or prepare a report. It can include rules for approvals and records, too.
Distributing skills and keeping copies current can take work, especially across different assistants. Depending on the host, a skill may need to be installed, enabled or updated wherever it is used.
A WORKMETHOD.md file lives alongside the files it governs. The method file itself needs no installation: the team updates it in place, and assistants with access can read the same current rules. An assistant still needs instructions to follow the convention, through the skill or an AGENTS.md reference.
WORKMETHOD.md separates a reusable procedure from the choices of the team using it: who owns the method, which decisions need a person, and how the rules apply to this work. Its record/ convention gives decisions and commitments dated, attributed entries. The workmethod-md skill teaches an assistant to follow that convention.
Doesn't MCP already connect the agent to our work?
Yes. The Model Context Protocol (MCP) connects AI applications to tools, data and workflows. An MCP server can also enforce permissions or provide a system of record.
The connection protocol itself does not define your team's approval rules or the record of what it decided and promised. WORKMETHOD.md supplies a written convention for those choices. An assistant can use MCP to reach the folders holding the method and record, subject to the host's permissions.
Could we put all of this in AGENTS.md?
You could. AGENTS.md gives coding agents project context and instructions, including rules for particular folders. You can put approval rules there and tell an agent to keep records.
WORKMETHOD.md makes the method and its record explicit for work beyond a code repository, including documents and projects in shared drives. It defines an owner, how method changes are approved, and how entries are added without rewriting earlier ones. AGENTS.md can point to that convention; the specification includes the instruction.
What does using them together look like?
A proposal-writing skill explains how to prepare a proposal. MCP provides a connection to the project files. AGENTS.md can direct a coding agent to follow the applicable methods. The project's WORKMETHOD.md names the person who must approve a price; its record preserves the attributed approval and later corrections.
You can build your own equivalent arrangement. This working draft offers a common convention that people and assistants can inspect in plain files, kept alongside the work.
Does a method file guarantee that an agent follows the rules?
No. Written instructions depend on an assistant reading and following them. A record can be incomplete or wrong. WORKMETHOD.md does not itself enforce permissions, prevent file edits, or prove that a decision was correct.
Keep access controls and review in the systems where the work happens. Check an assistant's behavior before relying on it. The known limits describe the working draft's boundaries.