If it feels like your team keeps revisiting the same conversations… you’re not alone.

Maybe someone asks, “Wait—are we still planning to redesign onboarding this quarter?”

Another chimes in, “I thought we were doing the sample data thing first?”

Then someone drops a six-week-old Slack thread with four conflicting opinions and no clear final call.

I’ve seen this exact conversation play out in almost every remote product team I’ve worked with. It’s not a communication problem. It’s a memory problem.

When decisions don’t have a dedicated home, they get buried in threads, meetings, and passing comments until no one’s quite sure what we agreed on, or why.

That’s where a decision log comes in. It gives your team a lightweight, reliable way to capture the choices that shape your work without relying on human memory, or having to dig through Slack archaeology.

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What’s a Decision Log?

Think of a decision log as your team’s lightweight memory bank. Not a backlog. Not a to-do list. Just a simple place to record the calls you’ve made and why, so you don’t have to keep repeating the same discussions.

You don’t need to capture every tiny choice. Just the ones that shift how you work, what you build, or how you communicate.

A good rule of thumb: If it took more than a quick yes and involved more than one person, it’s probably worth writing down.

Entries should be short, clear, and easy to scan. Here’s what a typical one might look like:

That’s it. No fluff. Just enough detail to give context, show what was considered, and help others understand what changed and why.

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Start With the Habit, Not the Tool

It doesn’t matter whether you use Notion, Google Docs, Coda, or something else. The tool is just the container. What matters is that someone (usually the team lead or a rotating owner) takes a few minutes each week to capture what happened.

A simple practice:

At the end of the week, pause and ask, Did we make any decisions that others might need to reference later?

If yes, log them.

Some teams call this “Decision Friday.” Others scan through the week’s threads on Monday morning. You can even add a line to the bottom of every meeting agenda:

Did we make a decision worth logging?

The goal is to make it routine. Low friction. Low effort. High return.

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Make It Sustainable

To keep your log from turning into a chore, focus on clarity over completeness. Bullet points are fine. You can link out to context instead of pasting walls of text. And don’t worry about perfectly tagging everything. Just make it easy to find and easy to use.

There’s no gold star for perfect formatting. The point is to help your team move faster, with less confusion.

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You Can Keep It Simple or Make It Smart

This habit works whether you write logs manually or automate them with AI. I’ve seen teams succeed both ways.

One of my current clients is a busy startup that barely has time for documentation. So instead of trying to force it, we built a lightweight automation. Now, if someone adds a specific emoji to a Slack thread where a decision happened, it triggers a workflow that pulls the conversation, formats it using the structure above, and drops it into a decision log database in Notion.

They can even chat with the bot inside Slack and ask things like, “What decision did we make about the onboarding flow?”

It’s not complicated, and that’s exactly why it’s working.

Whether you’re logging decisions by hand in a doc or layering on automation, the most important thing is that it’s accessible, consistent, and fits your team’s rhythm.

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Build a Brain Your Team Can Rely On

A decision log isn’t just about avoiding repeated debates. Over time, it becomes something bigger: a shared memory your team can count on.

It gives you a clear timeline of what changed, when, and why. It shortens the ramp for new hires. It makes performance reviews and quarterly updates easier because you’re not piecing together context from scattered threads.

Most of all, it increases speed. It clears the path, so your team can actually move forward instead of getting caught in the same old loops.

If you’ve ever found yourself saying, “Didn’t we already talk about this?”, it’s a sign your team needs this.

You don’t need a big process or fancy tools. Just a place to record what you decided, and why it matters.

It’s a small habit, but it solves a problem that shows up every single day. Confusion. Slack back-and-forth. Context lost in the shuffle. A simple decision log cuts through all of that. It gives your team just enough structure to move faster since they’re no longer second-guessing what’s already been decided.

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In Case You Missed It

​Four Levels of Remote/Distributed Communication​
This isn’t mine, but it’s worth your time. I loved this piece from Carter Baxter on the different layers of communication in remote teams and why most teams get stuck.

​How a Product Manager Uses AI to Go From Idea to Prototype​
This piece is part of our AI at Work series, where we spotlight how real people use AI in their daily work. In this one, a PM shares how he turns a voice note into a working prototype, all without waiting on design or dev. A great read for PMs and builders who are looking for AI workflow ideas.

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Work Forward Society Want to meet others who do work differently? Join us in making 2025 your year of less meetings and more real work! Join The Work Forward Society →

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What did you think of this issue? What do you hope to see in the next one? Hit reply and let me know. I read every response. I truly appreciate you taking the time to read this. Hope you have a lovely day! Marissa ​Founder, Remote Work Prep​ P.S. Did you enjoy this issue? Share the article with a friend. Struggling with a remote work problem? Book a coaching call. If you liked this, consider supporting this free newsletter by leaving a testimonial. ​

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