Checklist

Organizational Intelligence Starter Assessment

A 20-question, evidence-focused diagnostic teams can run in ~60 minutes to surface quick wins and blind spots across knowledge capture, decision clarity, measurement, meeting effectiveness, and experiment practice. Includes scoring guidance, suggested owners, evidence examples, and a 1-page leadership summary template.

Purpose and use

This one-hour starter assessment helps a team quickly surface the most important gaps that block continuous improvement. Use it as a facilitated team exercise: score each question with quick evidence, agree an owner for follow-up, and capture the top 3 actions on the 1-page summary for leadership.

How to run (60 minutes)

  • 5 min — Set context and hunger (why improving organizational learning matters now).
  • 30 min — Rapid scoring: 20 questions, ~1.5 minutes per question (discuss only when needed).
  • 10 min — Identify and agree top 3 gaps, owners, and near-term actions.
  • 15 min — Complete the 1-page summary template and assign follow-up.

Scoring

For each question, capture a score and brief evidence note.

  1. 0 — No: Little or no evidence this exists.
  2. 1 — Partial: Some practice or one-off examples, not consistent or owned.
  3. 2 — Yes: Clear, repeatable practice with owners and artifacts.

After scoring, highlight questions scoring 0 or 1 as gaps. For each gap, assign an owner and a next step with a due date.

Checklist — 20 quick diagnostic questions

Area A: Knowledge capture (4)

  1. Do we routinely capture decisions, key assumptions, and lessons from important projects or incidents? Evidence: saved decision logs, postmortems, or project retros saved in a known place.
  2. Are onboarding materials for common roles up-to-date and used to shorten ramp time? Evidence: role checklists, updated orientation deck, new-hire time-to-productivity metrics.
  3. Is there a simple taxonomy or folder structure that teams use consistently for knowledge artifacts? Evidence: documented naming conventions, few duplicates, searchable libraries.
  4. Do we have a lightweight process to keep critical documents current (owner + review cadence)? Evidence: ownership tags, review dates, recent update history.

Suggested owners for follow-up: Team lead or Knowledge Owner (e.g., librarian/coordinator), HR/Learning for onboarding items.

Area B: Decision clarity (4)

  1. Are major recurring decisions documented with who decides, by when, and which inputs matter? Evidence: decision registries, RACI notes, decision templates used in meetings.
  2. Does the team use a consistent decision process for novel or risky choices (e.g., small experiment, escalate, defer)? Evidence: decision checklist, examples of recent decisions following the process.
  3. Are decision owners and success criteria defined before execution? Evidence: action cards with owners and metrics or acceptance criteria.
  4. Are past decision outcomes reviewed to improve decision rules? Evidence: decision reviews, changes to decision criteria after lessons learned.

Suggested owners for follow-up: Product/ops lead, program manager, or decision steward.

Area C: Measurement & indicators (4)

  1. Do we track a small set of leading indicators that signal performance for our top priorities? Evidence: dashboards or reports with leading metrics, not just lagging ones.
  2. Are measurement definitions clear and shared (who measures, how, frequency)? Evidence: metric definitions doc or glossary with data owners.
  3. Do teams use indicators to change behavior (trigger meetings, experiments, or escalations)? Evidence: alerts, meeting agendas tied to metric thresholds, documented responses to signals.
  4. Is there a lightweight cadence to validate indicator usefulness (are we measuring the right things)? Evidence: periodic metric reviews, retired/updated metrics log.

Suggested owners for follow-up: Data owner, operations analyst, or function lead.

Area D: Meeting effectiveness (4)

  1. Do meetings have clear outcomes, agenda owners, and timeboxes? Evidence: agendas with desired decisions, meeting notes with action items.
  2. Are decisions and action owners captured and followed up after meetings? Evidence: action tracker with owners and due dates, evidence of closure.
  3. Do recurring meetings include a short learning or improvements segment (e.g., 5 minutes)? Evidence: agenda templates, notes showing retro or continuous improvement items.
  4. Is meeting attendance intentional (right people, invited only when needed)? Evidence: reduced attendee lists, invite rationale, no-show rates low.

Suggested owners for follow-up: Meeting owner (team lead, scrum master, or operations coordinator).

Area E: Experiment practice (4)

  1. Do we frame important changes as hypotheses with measurable outcomes? Evidence: experiment briefs, A/B docs, or pilot charters with metrics.
  2. Are experiments small, timeboxed, and designed to learn rather than only to deliver? Evidence: experiment plans, limited scope pilots with learning criteria.
  3. Are experiment results recorded and translated into decisions or next steps? Evidence: experiment reports, decision notes (scale, iterate, stop).
  4. Is there a safe pathway for teams to run low-risk experiments without heavy approvals? Evidence: experiment playbook, guardrails, and examples of prior safe experiments.

Suggested owners for follow-up: Improvement coach, product owner, or process owner.

Quick interpretation

Sum scores (max 40). Typical interpretations:

  • 30–40: Solid foundations — focus on scaling and maintaining practices.
  • 20–29: Some good practices but inconsistent — prioritize 3 highest-impact gaps.
  • <20: Foundational gaps — pick 1–2 quick wins to build momentum (knowledge capture, meeting accountability).

1-page summary template (fill and share with leadership)

Organizational Intelligence — 1-Page Summary

Team/Unit: [Team name]   Date: [MM/DD/YYYY]   Facilitator: [Name]

Top 3 gaps (why they matter)

  1. [Gap 1 — concise description] — Owner: [Name] — Next step & due date: [Action] / [DD/MM]
  2. [Gap 2 — concise description] — Owner: [Name] — Next step & due date: [Action] / [DD/MM]
  3. [Gap 3 — concise description] — Owner: [Name] — Next step & due date: [Action] / [DD/MM]

Quick wins we will try in 30 days

  • [Quick win A — owner — due date]
  • [Quick win B — owner — due date]

Risks or blockers needing help

[One-sentence summary of resource, policy, or cross-team help required]

Score summary

Total score: [#/40]   Notes: [short observation]

Recommended next step (within 7 days)

[Concrete step — e.g., owner schedules 30-min follow-up, creates action cards, and publishes updated doc]

Evidence and follow-up discipline

Capture the brief evidence note for any 0/1 scores and link or attach artifacts. Ensure each gap has a named owner and a near-term follow-up. Avoid surface-level diagnosis: require a follow-up owner and at least one concrete next step before closing the assessment session.

Suggested adaptations

This checklist is intentionally light. Consider converting it into an interactive form to store historic assessments, track progress, and roll up scores across teams (see capability notes).

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Discussion

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