Weekly Exec Brief

Weekly Exec Brief

Purpose

Most leaders start the week by reading everything themselves — Slack, email, three different dashboards — before they can tell their team what matters. This skill does the first pass: feed it whatever you've collected (team update docs, Slack recaps, metric screenshots described in text, meeting notes) and it produces one brief your leadership team can read in two minutes.

What to ask for if the input is incomplete

1. The raw material — team updates, metrics, notable emails or threads, anything gathered since the last brief
2. The audience — direct reports, full leadership team, or board-adjacent (this changes how much detail belongs in the brief)
3. Anything time-sensitive that must be flagged even if it's not the biggest story

If the raw material is thin in a section (for example, no metrics were provided), leave that section short rather than padding it — a brief that pads weak input teaches readers to skim past everything.

Output format

# Week of [date] — Exec Brief

## Top 3 Things to Know
1. [Most important item — one sentence, plus one sentence of context]
2. [Second item]
3. [Third item]

## Metrics Snapshot
- [Metric]: [value] ([up/down/flat] vs. last week)
- (only include metrics actually provided — do not fabricate a standard set)

## Team Highlights
- [Team/person]: [what happened, in one line]
- (group by team if multiple updates came in)

## Risks & Blockers
- [Risk or blocker] — [who owns resolving it]
- (this section is allowed to be empty — say "Nothing blocking" rather
  than inventing a risk)

## This Week's Focus
- [Priority 1]
- [Priority 2]
- [Priority 3]

Voice rules

• The "Top 3" section is the whole point — if a reader stops there, they should still know what matters. Write it last, after drafting the rest, so it's a true summary rather than a guess.
• One line per item wherever possible. This is a brief, not a report — link out to source docs instead of restating them in full.
• Flag risks in plain language ("we're going to miss the Q3 deadline unless X"), not euphemism ("some timeline pressure exists").
• Keep the leader's own phrasing for anything opinion-bearing — don't smooth a sharp assessment into something blander.

Example

Input (raw notes): "eng shipped the new exception-routing engine, early customers already seeing 30% fewer manual escalations. sales had a slow week, two deals slipped to next month but pipeline's still healthy. support tickets spiked bc of a NetSuite connector outage tuesday, need to figure out if we need dedicated on-call for integrations. marketing's webinar on 'ending the manual reconciliation spreadsheet' pulled 420 signups. board meeting thursday, need the deck by wednesday eod."

Output (excerpt):

## Top 3 Things to Know
1. Exception-routing engine shipped — early customers already seeing
   30% fewer manual escalations.
2. Tuesday's NetSuite connector outage spiked support volume; we likely
   need dedicated on-call coverage for integrations.
3. Board deck due Wednesday EOD for Thursday's meeting.

## Metrics Snapshot
- Manual escalations: -30% for customers on the new routing engine
- Webinar signups: 420 ("Ending the Manual Reconciliation Spreadsheet")

## Risks & Blockers
- Integration outages have no dedicated on-call yet — owner: Eng lead,
  needs a staffing decision this week.
- Two deals slipped to next month — pipeline still healthy overall,
  watching for a pattern.