The 1:1 Playbook
A complete playbook for weekly 1:1s: the default structure, scripts for announcing and running them, failure modes with fixes, and remote and AI-era variations.
Read the playbook →Playbooks
Field notes argue one idea at a time, and the field guide maps a territory. A playbook is the runnable layer: the moves for one recurring leadership situation, specific enough to run this week. Each one gives you the default play, scripts you can adapt, the failure modes with fixes, and the variations that matter.
They're written for humans first, and structured so an AI agent pointed at any page can use it too. Every playbook is free, as a page and as a PDF, no email required.
Playbooks
THE TEAM CYCLE · PLAYBOOK FAMILY
Four ceremonies, one loop. Plan the work, run the day, show the work, then look at how the work went.
The Planning Playbook
Most teams go through the motions in sprint planning, pulling stories in with little discussion or simply getting handed a list of what's in the sprint and told to start.
Read the playbook →The Standup Playbook
Most standups have become status meetings where everyone takes a turn, says what they did yesterday and what they're doing today, and the meeting ends with the same work sitting in the same place, all about the people and not the work.
Read the playbook →The Review Playbook
A complete playbook for the review: how it differs from the demo, scripts for converting and running one, failure modes with fixes, and AI-era variations.
Read the playbook →The Retrospective Playbook
A complete playbook for retrospectives: scripts for running one and rescuing a grump and dump, failure modes with fixes, follow-through, and AI-era variations.
Read the playbook →Feedback · Playbook Family
One discipline, three directions. Take one, or the whole set.
The Giving Feedback Playbook
A complete playbook for giving feedback: the ask-first default play, scripts, calibrating for power and experience, failure modes with fixes, and AI-era practice.
Read the playbook →The Receiving Feedback Playbook
A complete playbook for receiving feedback: naming the type before you react, finding the true part, receiving with power, failure modes with fixes, and AI-era practice.
Read the playbook →The Soliciting Feedback Playbook
A complete playbook for soliciting feedback: choosing who to ask, the named specific ask, listening without defending, failure modes with fixes, and AI-era practice.
Read the playbook →Templates
A template is the fill-in layer: a document your team completes together, once, and keeps. A playbook you read and run; a template you sit down and fill in.
AI-NATIVE OPERATING DOCUMENTS · TEMPLATE FAMILY
Five documents for running agents in real work: the checklist before a rollout, the standards while it runs, and the plan for when something breaks.
Agent Rollout Pre-Flight Checklist
A one-page checklist to send every team lead before the first agent rollout — six questions worth answering ahead of time.
Read the checklist →The AI Operating Model for Teams
A one-page reference for how a team works once agents do real work — the shifts, the tier scale, the values tie-break, and who answers for the outcome.
Read the one-pager →Definition of Verified
What verified means for agent-produced work on your team — written down before something ships that shouldn't have.
Read the template →Agent Incident Runbook
The plan you fill in before your first agent incident.
Read the template →The Agent Standup
A fill-in daily standup for an agent fleet: the same practice as a team standup, run for agents.
Read the template →BUYING COACHING · TEMPLATE FAMILY
Three templates for someone deciding to hire a coach, in the order they get used: choose the coach, agree the terms, then check whether it's working.
The Coach Evaluation Sheet
A one-page sheet for choosing a coach: the kind of help you need, what to ask on the fit call, what to expect stance by stance, and the self-check that tells you afterward whether it is working.
Read the one-pager →The Coaching Agreement Checklist
A one-page checklist for what to settle in writing before session one: goals, confidentiality and its limits, the three-way agreement when an employer pays, fees, how either side ends it, and which roles the coach may occupy.
Read the checklist →Is Coaching Working? A Self-Check
A one-page self-check to run at the start and after the first month: readiness, who fills the silence, the relationship itself, side effects to watch for, and when to raise it.
Read the checklist →Kits
A kit is a guided route through the playbooks and templates for one situation.
The New Engineering Leader's Kit for the AI-Native Era
Five things different at day 90, and the playbooks, templates, and diagnostics that get you there, built for a VP or Director stepping into a new engineering org, or any leader taking their org into a new way of working.
Read the kit →This shelf grows. New playbooks are added as they clear review.