10 Skills for Important Decisions
Clarify an important choice, compare options, question assumptions, and record the reasons for your decision.
Make a decision you can explain
Each skill gives your AI assistant instructions for a specific task.
For founders, managers, and HR leads in teams of about 20–200 people. Use one skill for a specific problem, or work through the pack step by step.
Explain the situation and what you want to achieve. The assistant will ask questions and help you prepare. Before using its suggestions, check the facts and make sure they fit the situation. Ask the people involved for any information you are missing.
We need to decide whether to take on a large new client when our team is already busy. Help me compare the options and risks.
Choose a skill for your situation.
Open a skill below to see what it helps you do. After installing the skill or pasting its prompt into your assistant, use the suggested starting phrase.
Clarify the Decision
Define the question, intended result, decision owner, deadline, limits, and missing facts before comparing options.
Run decision-frame.
Download instructionsCreate Real Alternatives
Develop a shortlist of practical alternatives and explain how each would work, what it needs, and who it affects.
Run decision-options.
Download instructionsCompare Trade-offs
Compare each option’s likely benefits, costs, and effects on people against the outcomes and requirements that matter.
Run decision-tradeoffs.
Download instructionsCheck Your Estimate Against Past Cases
Use comparable past cases to question an estimate, identify relevant differences, and show what remains uncertain.
Run decision-uncertainty.
Download instructionsChallenge Your Preferred Option
Identify the assumptions behind your preferred choice and plan checks for evidence that could prove them wrong.
Run decision-counterevidence.
Download instructionsPlan How to Gather Independent Views
Prepare neutral questions and a plan for gathering people’s views before group discussion, then comparing their evidence and concerns.
Run decision-independent-input.
Download instructionsExplore How the Plan Could Fail
Imagine plausible ways the plan could fail, then identify early warning signs, prevention steps, and fallback actions.
Run decision-premortem.
Download instructionsFind What Would Change Your Choice
Explore how different assumptions or priorities affect the choice and decide which missing information is worth gathering.
Run decision-sensitivity.
Download instructionsWrite the Decision Record
Record the choice, reasons, assumptions, remaining concerns, next actions, and when to reconsider.
Run decision-record.
Download instructionsReview the Decision With What You Knew Then
Compare expectations with results, assess the reasoning using information available at the time, and consider whether the choice should change.
Run decision-review.
Download instructionsOne download. Several ways to use it.
Unzip the download, then follow the instructions for your assistant.
Open one prompt file in portable/, copy its contents into a chat, and describe your situation.
To keep the whole pack in a project, upload portable/ALL-SKILLS.md as a project source, then paste the contents of PROJECT-INSTRUCTIONS.md into the project's instructions. If the assistant does not follow an uploaded prompt, paste that prompt directly into the chat.
In Claude, upload the individual skill ZIPs from install/ using the custom Skills feature. For another assistant that supports Agent Skills, copy the skill folders you need from skills/ into the directory that assistant uses for skills.
See README.md for installation options and a list of the included files.
Free for internal and client work under the Polar Bear license. Not for resale. Available features and results depend on the assistant you use.
Understand the research behind the pack.
The research notes explain which studies informed the skills, what those studies found, and where the findings may not apply. We have not tested whether these AI skills improve workplace outcomes.
Replace real names with placeholders and share only the information the assistant needs. You are responsible for checking facts, making decisions, and speaking with others. If the assistant predicts how someone might react, treat that as one possibility. Ask the person directly when you need to understand their view.
Download the research notes