Flow Decision Triggers are common signals or struggles that prompt the need for a Flow Decision Record (FDR). Use these to help describe the context of your decision and connect it to recurring patterns.

A. Delivery Struggles

  • 🐢 Slow delivery velocity
    Work is not getting done fast enough to meet goals or user expectations.

  • 🔀 Frequent context-switching
    Teams are juggling competing priorities or working across too many domains.

  • 🤝 High number of handoffs
    Work frequently changes hands, delaying progress and causing rework.

B. Structural Misalignment

  • 🚧 Misaligned team boundaries
    Team ownership doesn’t match the shape of value streams or user needs.

  • ❓ Ambiguous ownership
    Responsibilities are unclear, duplicated, or shared in ways that block progress.

  • 🧱 Overloaded teams
    One team owns too much, resulting in bottlenecks or burnout.

C. User and Stakeholder Signals

  • 🙅‍♂️ Unmet user needs
    A known user or customer need is being neglected or delayed.

  • 😠 Stakeholder dissatisfaction
    Product, business, or internal stakeholders are expressing frustration or concern.

  • 📞 Increasing support requests
    Internal or external teams are escalating issues or requesting too much help.

D. Interaction Friction

  • 🗓️ Coordination overload
    Too much time is spent planning, aligning, or negotiating across teams.

  • ⏰ Temporal coupling
    Teams are required to work in lockstep or synchronize timelines to deliver value.

  • 🧱 Hard-to-use platform or services
    Platform or shared services are causing delays or confusion.

  • ⚠️ Unreliable delivery dependencies
    Teams are blocked by other teams or services with no clear resolution path.

E. Strategic Change

  • 🎯 New strategic initiative
    A shift in company or product strategy requires realigning structures to match.

  • 🪓 Capability expansion or split
    A team or service is growing beyond a reasonable size or scope.

  • 🔍 Org-level flow review
    Part of a regular cadence of reviewing and improving flow, not just reactive.

After identifying a trigger, you can use the Flow Decision Outcomes to help you understand the required impact of the decision.

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