PR/FAQ (Working Backwards) Expert

Overview

The PR/FAQ is Amazon's "working backwards" artifact: before any team is funded to build a product, the PM writes a future-dated press release and an FAQ that anticipates every hard question. The discipline forces clarity on customer, problem, and outcome before a single design decision is made. If the team cannot write a compelling, credible PR/FAQ, the idea is not ready.

Use this skill when you need a high-fidelity narrative artifact for funding review, executive sponsorship, or a "should we even do this?" decision. The output is a single Markdown document with three sections: the press release, an internal FAQ (the questions your CFO, lawyer, and head of engineering will ask), and an external FAQ (the questions customers and press will ask). The PR/FAQ is not a PRD substitute -- it precedes the PRD -- and is not a marketing draft. The "Press Release Test" is the bar: if the press release would not strike a customer as genuinely newsworthy, the idea needs more work.

Core Capabilities

• Press release -- the 9-part future-dated release in plain customer language, with the Press Release Test and headline/quote failure modes
• Internal FAQ -- 10-20 honest Q&A pairs across 9 required categories (demand, business model, strategic fit, competition, feasibility, ops, legal, risk, scope/alternatives)
• External FAQ -- buyer- and customer-facing questions that double as the first draft of help-center and sales-enablement content
• Review choreography -- the "5 readers" rule, versioning, and handoff to the PRD

When to Use

• Funding gate -- A new initiative needs executive approval before spend.
• Concept stress-test -- An idea is exciting internally but you suspect the customer narrative is weak.
• Cross-team alignment -- Eng, design, marketing, and exec sponsors need one document they all agree on before kickoff.
• Portfolio bake-off -- Two or three competing ideas need apples-to-apples comparison; PR/FAQs reveal the strongest customer story.
• Reframe a stalled project -- A product in flight has lost the customer plot; rewriting the PR/FAQ surfaces what was lost.

When NOT to use: incremental features on an existing product (use wwas/ or job-stories/); a signed-off PRD mid-build; pure technical infrastructure with no end-customer narrative.

Clarify First

Before generating the PR/FAQ, confirm these inputs. If any is unknown or vague, ASK — do not assume:

• Customer + problem — the "for [customer]" and the pain they feel today (drives the one-liner and press-release lead)
• What makes it newsworthy — the genuinely-new outcome (drives the headline and the Press Release Test pass/fail)
• Hardest internal objection — the CFO/eng/legal question you most fear (sets which of the 9 internal-FAQ categories to load)
• Decision being made — funding gate vs concept stress-test vs reframe (sets the bar and the primary reader)

Stop rule: ask only the 2-3 that most change the output. If the user says "just draft it," proceed and list your assumptions at the top of the artifact.

Quick Start

1. Complete the one-liner: "We are announcing [product] for [customer] that does [outcome]."
2. Draft the press release first; do not write any FAQ until it passes the Press Release Test with one outside reader.
3. Write the internal FAQ in question/answer pairs (PM asks, sponsor/finance/eng answers), then the external FAQ last.
4. Run the "5 readers" rule, date and save the artifact, then hand off to create-prd/.

Use assets/prfaq_template.md as the fill-in scaffold. See references/prfaq-playbook.md for the full structure, FAQ categories, sample questions, workflow, and troubleshooting.

References

• references/prfaq-playbook.md — the Working Backwards method, the 9-part press-release structure and test, internal/external FAQ category requirements and sample questions, the authoring workflow, troubleshooting, and success criteria. Read when drafting or reviewing a PR/FAQ.
• references/working-backwards-guide.md — deep dive on the Amazon method, its origin/intent, and the review choreography that makes it effective. Read for context on why the discipline works.
• references/red-flags.md — common ways a PR/FAQ goes wrong, with concrete fixes. Read before circulating a draft for review.
• assets/prfaq_template.md — complete fill-in PR/FAQ template (PR + internal FAQ + external FAQ).

Scope & Limitations

In scope: press-release drafting in the Working Backwards format; internal FAQ across the 9 categories; external buyer/customer FAQ; the Press Release Test protocol; handoff to PRD (create-prd/) and roadmap (outcome-roadmap/).

Out of scope: marketing/ad copy or external launch press (handoff to marketing); detailed PRD authoring (create-prd/); OKR definition (brainstorm-okrs/); backlog drafting (wwas/, job-stories/); pricing strategy or financial modeling (finance/).

Caveats: The PR/FAQ is an internal alignment artifact, not for external publication. The format works best in cultures that tolerate written narrative memos; slide-deck cultures may need to adopt it gradually. A weak PR/FAQ is a feature, not a bug — it surfaces a weak idea; fix the idea, do not inflate the language.

Integration Points