Decision log

A running record of each decision you make, capturing what was decided, when, on what evidence, by whom, the reasoning behind it, and what would make it worth revisiting.

A decision log is a running record of each decision you make, capturing what was decided, when, on what evidence, by whom, the reasoning behind it, and what would make it worth revisiting. The point is to preserve the why so a choice can be traced and rechecked later. Say your team picks one tool for a to-do app and writes the entry: decided to use it because it was free and already approved, on March 3, owner the project lead, revisit if the free tier adds a fee. Three months later someone asks why, and instead of guessing you open the entry and read the reasoning and the evidence it rested on.

Builder example

When you ask an assistant to summarize a meeting, tell it to write any decision into a log entry with the decision, date, source, owner, rationale, and a revisit condition, not just a bullet of action items. An assistant that captures only outcomes leaves you unable to tell whether circumstances have shifted enough to reopen a choice. Logging the reasoning and the evidence behind it lets the assistant later surface which past decisions a new development might overturn.

Common confusion: A decision log records why a decision was made and what would reopen it. A task list records what still needs doing. The same meeting feeds both, yet only the decision log preserves the reasoning, so a choice can be traced back to its evidence months later.