Best Practices for Decision Pages

Title

1. Choosing the title is important. Make the title descriptive and easy to understand. For example, if the decision is about vendor records, put “vendor records” in the title.

2. Indicate the phase in the title. For example, vanguard decisions should include “Vanguard” in the title to make them easy to see in a list. 

Stakeholders

1. When you create a decision page, do a thorough stakeholder “inventory” to ensure all voices are heard in decision-making. 

   • List each stakeholder you will consult with on the decision page, both within the cohort and outside the cohort, e.g., CKGs, etc.

2. Notify consulted groups well in advance that they will be consulted on a decision. Add your group’s abbreviated name to the label for that decision (using the approved tagging taxonomy) if the owning group has not already done it.

3. Define what the acronym RACI means as a quick reference at the top of the rollup page or decision page.

   • R = Responsible. Assigned to do the work and make an assessment (“recommender”)

   • A = Accountable. The owner and final decider (“approver”)

   • C = Consulted. Must be consulted before a decision is made

   • I = Informed. Informed that a decision or action has been taken

Decision-making

1. Split a decision page into two if an issue needs to be continued by 2 different groups.

2. Be clear what the approval path is

3. Describe the decision-making process thoroughly

4. After a decision is final, briefly summarize the decision in the table at the top of the page.

5. Use the action log to track work. These decision pages are dynamic and change. Make sure any significant changes are called out. 

6. If you make a change to the recommendation after it’s final, make sure the approving group, such as PPC, approves the change. In addition, add an “update” section and note the update in the action log.

Useful to include

1. Add an Assessment section that describes how the decision will be made and evaluated, i.e., this is how we’ll decide; these are the pitfalls we might encounter; this is how we’ll evaluate our decision to know if it was successful.

2. Add Assumptions and modify or annotate them as you learn more. 

3. Call out Dependencies with other groups, activities, and decisions.
   
   

Monitoring decisions

1. Tag groups within the cohort that are consulted in decisions. Use Taxonomy for tagging groups on decision pages  (includes instructions.) 

2. Create a decision rollup to monitor decisions where your group is consulted.

   • Tip: Copy Discovery groups consulted decision rollup and edit the Page Properties Report. Change the label from “discovery” to your group’s tag. See Taxonomy page (linked above) for abbreviations.

3. Add a link to the SILS all decisions rollup page (includes all statuses, e.g.,  not started, decided, in progress, etc.) to your group’s home page on Confluence so the page is easier to find.