The Product Architect

Field Kit

Templates a builder brings to a meeting. The chapter is where each one is authored. The field kit is where it lives as a tool.

The kit

Seven instruments, none of them homework.

Each entry opens into the same diagram, structure, and usage prompt the chapter authored. Copy the structure into your working document. Carry the artifact, not the apparatus.

Decision guide

When should an AI feature ask for approval?

Separate confidence, authority, consequence, and recovery.

Writing guide

How to write a behavior specification

Turn “the system should” into eight choices a team can review.

  1. Behavior spec

    From Designing Behavior, Not Just Interaction

    Behavior Spec

    A structured template for separating exact rules, interpretive assistance, evidence, measured reliability, authority, consequences, recovery, correction, and backoff.

    Open

  2. Behavior design questions

    From Designing Behavior, Not Just Interaction

    Behavior Design Questions

    A working list of questions to ask when designing behavior rather than interaction.

    Open

  3. Trust audit

    From Trust Is a Product Layer

    The Trust Stack

    Names the structural materials of trust in intelligent systems, from expressive at the top to foundational at the bottom.

    Open

  4. Workflow canvas

    From Workflow Authors Reshape the Work

    Workflow Authorship Canvas

    A canvas for redesigning a workflow rather than wrapping it in better UI.

    Open

  5. Leverage lens

    From Builders Need Strategy Now

    Leverage Lens

    A strategic filter for product bets: clarity, speed, confidence, quality, coordination, decision-making. A bet that improves none of these is noise.

    Open

  6. Prototype brief

    From Prototype the Behavior

    Behavior Prototype Checklist

    Scopes a prototype as an instrument for a named risk, from a sketch or clickable flow to running behavior.

    Open

  7. Practice note

    From The Practice of Product Authorship

    Authorship Practice

    The six commitments that constitute the practice of product authorship over time: standards, point of view, taste, responsibility, consistency, reflection.

    Open