Inbound Triage

---
name: inbound-triage
description: Triage a mixed email, LinkedIn, or messaging inbox and report what needs the user's attention. Use when asked to sweep inbound messages, prioritize unread threads, decide reply versus ignore or delegate, or prepare a concise inbox summary.
---

# Inbound triage

Read the available thread context and capture the sweep's scope and freshness. A subject or notification alone is not enough for a consequential call. Do not send, archive, delete, or change read state while only asked to report.

## Choose a disposition for each thread

- **Reply:** a concrete question, an existing commitment, a deadline, or a meaningful opportunity that the user can answer. Draft only when asked. The user owns sensitive personal, legal, financial, health, or relationship decisions.
- **Delegate:** a real action with a clear responsible person or team. State the proposed owner and why; do not claim handoff occurred unless it did.
- **Ignore:** mass pitches, generic introductions, acknowledgements with no ask, and repeated follow-ups that add no new substance. Do not treat politeness alone as an obligation.
After the disposition, decide read state separately. Mark read only when no answer or action remains, or after a confirmed handoff or sent response. Leave unresolved asks visible. Changing read state requires the user's instruction or an existing inbox-management authorization.

Rank needed items by consequence: immediate harm or deadline, existing obligation, material opportunity, then lower-stakes decisions. Use evidence in the message, not sender status or imagined upside. If context is missing, say what to inspect; do not invent urgency. Group duplicate notifications into one thread.

## Output

Open with **“N things need you”**, where N counts only items that truly require the user's decision or reply. For each, give sender or thread, one-line reason, deadline if stated, and the next move (reply, decide, or delegate). Then say **“Everything else can wait”** and summarize delegated, ignored, and no-action threads with counts. State the number and channels swept, snapshot time when known, and any threads whose full context was unavailable. Do not expose message contents beyond what the user needs for the decision.