Decision Log Setup Skill
Teams re-decide because decisions evaporate: made in a meeting, mentioned in a thread, remembered differently by everyone, and relitigated the moment someone new (or someone persistent) asks "wait, why do we…?" The decision log is the cheapest institutional memory there is — one line per decision (what, why, who, when, and the reopening rule) — but logs fail as shelf-ware unless capture is wired into existing moments (the meeting's last five minutes, the thread's landing) and retrieval becomes reflex ("checked the log?" as the first response to why-questions).
What This Skill Produces
- The format — the five-field line, with the two-sentence-why discipline and the option-we-rejected field that does the anti-relitigation work
- The capture wiring — the existing moments (decision-meeting-format closes, thread-to-decision landings, 1:1 calls) that now end with a log line
- The reopening rule — what reopens a decision (new information) and what doesn't (new mood, new people)
- The retrieval habits — the log-first reflex, the onboarding tour, the link-not-relitigate response
Required Inputs
Ask for these if not provided:
- Where decisions currently happen — the meetings, threads, and hallways; capture wires into real venues, and unwired venues keep leaking
- The platform — a doc, a wiki page, a database/table; sortable-and-searchable beats beautiful, and the log lives where the team already looks
- The scope line — which decisions get logged (the test: would someone plausibly ask "why" in six months?) vs. the operational micro-calls that don't; over-logging kills the habit as surely as under-logging kills the value
- The relitigation history — the decisions that keep reopening; they get back-filled first, because they're the demonstration
Framework: The Log Rules
- The line is five fields and stays a line: date · decision (one sentence, the what) · why (two sentences max, including the rejected alternative: "chose X over Y because Z") · decider · reopening trigger. The rejected-alternative clause is the anti-relitigation payload — "we considered that and here's why not" is the sentence that ends the third rehash.
- Capture rides existing rituals: the decision meeting's on-screen close writes the line · the thread landing's record is the line · the weekly's "any decisions this week?" sweeps the strays. New ceremony fails; hitching to existing ceremony sticks. One person per venue owns the write (the facilitator, the thread-lander).
- The reopening rule is stated per decision: default — "reopens on new information, not new preferences" — with specific triggers where known ("revisit if churn exceeds X"). This converts "can we talk about this again?" from a social negotiation into a rule lookup, which is the log's quiet superpower.
- Retrieval is the ROI moment: the why-question response becomes a link ("logged here — short version: chose X over Y for Z"), the onboarding tour includes the log's greatest hits, and decisions cite prior decisions ("consistent with #47"). A log that's written but never linked is a diary; the link habit is what compounds.
- Back-fill the greatest hits only: the 10–15 decisions people actually re-ask about get retro-logged (best-effort whys, marked as reconstructed) — full historical back-fill is archaeology that delays the living log. Forward capture from today; history only where it's actively bleeding.
Output Format
Decision Log: [team] — lives at [location]
The Format
| Date |
Decision |
Why (incl. rejected alt.) |
Decider |
Reopens if |
Capture Wiring
[Venue → moment → who writes the line · the weekly sweep as the catch-all]
The Reopening Rule
[The default · how specific triggers get set · the link-instead-of-debate response]
Retrieval Habits
[The why-question → link reflex · onboarding's greatest-hits tour · the back-fill list (10–15, marked reconstructed)]
Quality Checks
Anti-Patterns
1---2name: decision-log-setup3description: Set up the team decision log that ends relitigation — the one-line-per-decision format (what, why, who, when, reopening rule), the capture moments wired into existing rituals, and the lookup habit that makes it pay. Use when asked set up a decision log, we keep re-deciding the same things, where do decisions get recorded, or new people keep asking why we do X. Produces the log format, the capture wiring, the reopening rule, and the retrieval habits.4---5
6# Decision Log Setup Skill
7
8Teams re-decide because decisions evaporate: made in a meeting, mentioned in a thread, remembered differently by everyone, and relitigated the moment someone new (or someone persistent) asks "wait, why do we…?" The decision log is the cheapest institutional memory there is — one line per decision (what, why, who, when, and the reopening rule) — but logs fail as shelf-ware unless *capture is wired into existing moments* (the meeting's last five minutes, the thread's landing) and *retrieval becomes reflex* ("checked the log?" as the first response to why-questions).
9
10## What This Skill Produces
11
12- **The format** — the five-field line, with the two-sentence-why discipline and the option-we-rejected field that does the anti-relitigation work
13- **The capture wiring** — the existing moments ([decision-meeting-format](../decision-meeting-format/SKILL.md) closes, [thread-to-decision](../thread-to-decision/SKILL.md) landings, 1:1 calls) that now end with a log line
14- **The reopening rule** — what reopens a decision (new information) and what doesn't (new mood, new people)
15- **The retrieval habits** — the log-first reflex, the onboarding tour, the link-not-relitigate response
16
17## Required Inputs
18
19Ask for these if not provided:
20- **Where decisions currently happen** — the meetings, threads, and hallways; capture wires into real venues, and unwired venues keep leaking
21- **The platform** — a doc, a wiki page, a database/table; sortable-and-searchable beats beautiful, and the log lives where the team already looks
22- **The scope line** — which decisions get logged (the test: would someone plausibly ask "why" in six months?) vs. the operational micro-calls that don't; over-logging kills the habit as surely as under-logging kills the value
23- **The relitigation history** — the decisions that keep reopening; they get back-filled first, because they're the demonstration
24
25## Framework: The Log Rules
26
271. **The line is five fields and stays a line:** date · decision (one sentence, the *what*) · why (two sentences max, including the rejected alternative: "chose X over Y because Z") · decider · reopening trigger. The rejected-alternative clause is the anti-relitigation payload — "we considered that and here's why not" is the sentence that ends the third rehash.
282. **Capture rides existing rituals:** the decision meeting's on-screen close writes the line · the thread landing's record *is* the line · the weekly's "any decisions this week?" sweeps the strays. New ceremony fails; hitching to existing ceremony sticks. One person per venue owns the write (the facilitator, the thread-lander).
293. **The reopening rule is stated per decision:** default — "reopens on new information, not new preferences" — with specific triggers where known ("revisit if churn exceeds X"). This converts "can we talk about this again?" from a social negotiation into a rule lookup, which is the log's quiet superpower.
304. **Retrieval is the ROI moment:** the why-question response becomes a link ("logged here — short version: chose X over Y for Z"), the onboarding tour includes the log's greatest hits, and *decisions cite prior decisions* ("consistent with #47"). A log that's written but never linked is a diary; the link habit is what compounds.
315. **Back-fill the greatest hits only:** the 10–15 decisions people actually re-ask about get retro-logged (best-effort whys, marked as reconstructed) — full historical back-fill is archaeology that delays the living log. Forward capture from today; history only where it's actively bleeding.
32
33## Output Format
34
35# Decision Log: [team] — lives at [location]
36
37## The Format
38| Date | Decision | Why (incl. rejected alt.) | Decider | Reopens if |
39|---|---|---|---|---|
40
41## Capture Wiring
42[Venue → moment → who writes the line · the weekly sweep as the catch-all]
43
44## The Reopening Rule
45[The default · how specific triggers get set · the link-instead-of-debate response]
46
47## Retrieval Habits
48[The why-question → link reflex · onboarding's greatest-hits tour · the back-fill list (10–15, marked reconstructed)]
49
50## Quality Checks
51
52- [ ] Every field fits the one-line discipline; whys include the rejected alternative
53- [ ] Capture is attached to named existing moments with named writers
54- [ ] The reopening default is stated and per-decision triggers are possible
55- [ ] The link-first response habit has been demonstrated on a real why-question
56- [ ] Back-fill stopped at the greatest hits
57
58## Anti-Patterns
59
60- [ ] Do not log without the rejected alternative — "we chose X" without "over Y because Z" relitigates fine
61- [ ] Do not build capture as new ceremony — hitch to rituals that already happen
62- [ ] Do not log everything — the six-month-why test keeps the log readable and the habit light
63- [ ] Do not let new-people-energy reopen settled calls — the rule distinguishes information from mood
64- [ ] Do not write and never link — retrieval is where the log earns; capture alone is journaling
Mohit Aggarwal