World Model Readiness
Engraved team-practice instrument

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Team Practice

Module · What leaves when one person does

The Team Knowledge Resilience Check

Every team has a person whose absence would hurt more than the org chart suggests: the one who knows why the workaround exists, which client cannot be pushed, how the fragile process actually holds together. That knowledge is invisible until it walks out the door. AI can help capture and surface it, but only if it was ever written down. This module checks the five things that decide whether your team survives a departure intact: whether you know your bus factor, whether you document judgment and not just steps, how long onboarding really takes, how many single points of failure you carry, and whether capturing knowledge is a habit or an afterthought.

Question 1 of 5 · Bus factor is known

Do you know which one person leaving would hurt your team most?

Bus factor is the number of people who would have to vanish before your team seizes up, and for most teams it is uncomfortably close to one. Knowing who that person is, and for which knowledge, is the first step. Not knowing means you will find out the hard way, on their last day.

Question 2 of 5 · Judgment is documented

Does your documentation capture judgment, or just the steps?

Most documentation records what to do, not why or when to deviate. The steps are the easy part; the value is in the judgment: when to break the process, which exception matters, what the numbers do not show. A team that documents only procedure keeps the manual and loses the expertise.

Question 3 of 5 · Onboarding is quick

How long before a new team member can work without constant help?

Onboarding time is a direct readout of how well your knowledge is captured. If it takes six months for someone to become self-sufficient, that is six months of knowledge locked in other people's heads. Fast onboarding is not about smart hires; it is about knowledge that is written down and findable.

Question 4 of 5 · Few single holders

How much of your team's critical knowledge sits with exactly one person?

A single holder is a single point of failure: one person who alone knows the system, the relationship, the fix. Every one of them is a risk you are carrying whether you priced it or not. Spreading that knowledge, through pairing, rotation, or documentation, is how you stop betting the team on one person's attendance.

Question 5 of 5 · Capture is a habit

Is capturing knowledge a routine, or something you do when someone quits?

Knowledge capture that only happens during an exit interview is knowledge capture that has already mostly failed. When capturing what you learn is a normal part of the work, resilience compounds quietly. When it is a panic triggered by a resignation letter, you get whatever the leaving person can dump in their last two weeks.

For the statistics · one click each

Three questions for the public picture

These do not affect your score. They feed the anonymised, aggregated statistics; groups under 8 respondents are never shown.

If your most knowledgeable person left tomorrow, how badly would your team hurt?

We would be crippled
Serious disruption
Manageable
We would be fine
We do not know

How much of your team's knowledge is actually documented?

Almost none
Steps but not judgment
Judgment partly captured
Most, kept current
We are not sure

How long until a new hire works without constant help?

Several months
A few weeks
Days to a week
Days, self-serve
We have not measured

Your context

Used to calibrate the report. Company size and sector remain in the anonymized dataset; your email does not.

What the five levels look like

Every dimension in this assessment is scored 1 to 5. This is what the levels mean, dimension by dimension. The graded report diagnoses where your own answers land and what to do about it.

Bus factor is known

  1. 1No idea
  2. 2Vague sense
  3. 3Named informally
  4. 4Mapped clearly
  5. 5Mapped, being reduced

At the low end: If you do not know whose departure would cripple your team, you are one resignation away from a crisis you never saw coming. Map who holds the critical knowledge this month, before the market does it for you. What good looks like: A clear bus-factor map that you are actively reducing is genuine resilience. Keep it current as people and processes change; the single point of failure moves around.

Judgment is documented

  1. 1Nothing written
  2. 2Steps only
  3. 3Some context
  4. 4Judgment captured
  5. 5Judgment, kept live

At the low end: With nothing written down, every departure takes the whole playbook with it. Start by capturing the judgment behind your most critical process, not just the clicks. What good looks like: Documented judgment, kept alive, is what lets someone new make good calls and not just follow instructions. Keep refreshing it; captured judgment goes stale as the work evolves.

Onboarding is quick

  1. 1Many months
  2. 2A couple months
  3. 3A few weeks
  4. 4Days to weeks
  5. 5Days, self-serve

At the low end: Onboarding that drags on for months is a symptom of knowledge trapped in people rather than in documents. Have your next hire write down every question they had to ask, and fix the gaps they find. What good looks like: Fast, self-serve onboarding proves your knowledge lives in findable form, not just in heads. Keep the onboarding material current; it decays the moment the process changes and nobody updates it.

Few single holders

  1. 1Everything siloed
  2. 2Many single holders
  3. 3Some overlap
  4. 4Mostly shared
  5. 5Deliberately spread

At the low end: When critical knowledge sits in silos of one, your team is a collection of single points of failure. Pick the riskiest silo and pair someone alongside its holder starting now. What good looks like: Knowledge deliberately spread across people is what makes a team robust to any one departure. Keep spreading it as new critical knowledge forms; today's shared expertise is tomorrow's new silo if you stop.

Capture is a habit

  1. 1Only at exit
  2. 2When we remember
  3. 3Periodic pushes
  4. 4Regular routine
  5. 5Built into the work

At the low end: Capturing knowledge only when someone quits means you are always documenting in a panic and always missing most of it. Build a small, regular capture habit so resilience accrues before the resignation, not after. What good looks like: Capture built into the daily work is how a team stays resilient without heroics. Keep it low-friction; the moment documenting becomes a chore, it quietly stops happening.