How to use goals to implement a new project
Using /goal can help you implement a project from a PRD completely hands-off
The /goal feature in Codex and Claude Code is a crazy powerful way to go even more hands-off with your agents.
Goals help you go from back and forth prompts to repeatable outcomes.
If you want a refresher on goals, check out this earlier post on Codex goals.
How are goals different than prompts?
One highlight from the post explaining goals in detail is how they differ from prompts.
Prompts can be a tedious chat-based workflow. Sometimes when you’re working on a big project, you’ll find yourself snapping at your agent, telling it to “keep going”, “finish the implementation”, or “run all the tests now”.
If you’re doing something that involves evaulating output from the previous response, goals can help you iterate faster by pulling yourself out of the loop.
This lets agentic software tools like Codex and Claude Code operate more independently, which helps you get more out of your token spend.
Working from a PRD
Goals require specific outcome definition, which is a great reason to reach for a PRD (Product Requirements Document).
In our post explaining how to use AI to plan a new project, we explained how to use a chat-based tool like ChatGPT to get to a PRD.
You don’t have to use AI to get a PRD, or even have a PRD at all, but this is a great way to get moving on your project faster (and with more confidence that it will actually be okay).
Once you have a PRD or a document describing the detailed requirements of your project, you can get started using /goal in Claude Code or Codex to implement it.
I’ll walk you through it now, showing how I use this exact process to make a tool that helps me distribute my newsletter with AI.
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Implementing a PRD with /goal
You can use goals in Claude Code or Codex, including the Codex CLI. I’ve been daily-driving the Codex app most of the time, so that’s what I’ll use for this walkthrough.
First, I’ll put my PRD in codex and ask it to make a PLAN.md from it. Then, I’ll use /goal to have it autonomously implement that plan. Take a look at the first piece:
