Organizational Memory
MethodKit for Memory & Reminiscence

Capture how your
organization actually works.

66 cards covering every facet of the company brain, from strategy and culture to money, operations, and the knowledge that walks out the door when people leave. Put them on the table and the whole organization comes into view.

Explore the library Free to read
66 facets of the company brain
One deck · one company brain · every angle
66cards
8themes
330questions to explore
1company brain
01.

What this kit is

Organizational memory is what keeps a company from re-learning the same lessons every time someone new joins or someone experienced leaves. It is less about documentation and more about deciding what is actually worth writing down. Four starting points.

Knowledge leaves with people
Idea 01Most of what makes an organization work lives in people's heads: the context behind a decision, the reason a process works a certain way, the relationship that makes a partnership tick. None of that transfers automatically when someone moves on.
Tacit knowledge is the hard part
Idea 02Written procedures are easy to document. The hard part is the unwritten kind: the workarounds, the unspoken rules, the things everyone assumes someone else knows. Making that knowledge visible is the real work.
A single source of truth reduces friction
Idea 03When people cannot find the answer, they ask someone, hold a meeting, or guess. Every one of those is a hidden cost. A well-maintained company brain replaces repeated questions with a place people can actually look.
Future-you and new hires are the readers
Idea 04The best reason to document how the organization works is not for today, when everyone already knows. It is for six months from now, when a new person joins, a founder steps back, or a team changes hands and nobody remembers why things are the way they are.
02.

Stop the first leak

You do not need a knowledge-management programme to begin. These are the first moves that keep a team's hardest-won knowledge from quietly walking out the door.

01 Name the single points of failure

Walk the team and ask one question: if this person left tomorrow, what would we not know how to do? The names and tasks that come up are your first capture list, ahead of anything else.

02 Write down the why, not just the how

For each risky area, capture the reasoning behind how things are done, not only the steps. The steps can be relearned. The context behind a decision, once it leaves, is gone for good.

03 Give it one home

Pick the one place this lives, a wiki, a shared drive, a doc, and put it there. A single findable location beats a perfect system nobody opens. Link it from wherever people already look.

04 Capture it on the way out

Whenever someone changes role or leaves, hold a short handover focused on the undocumented parts. Make it routine, so the knowledge is recorded while the person is still there to explain it.

03.

The life of what you know

Organizational memory is not a filing cabinet, it is a cycle. Knowledge gets captured, stored, found, passed on, and kept current, or it leaks. Follow the cards along that lifecycle rather than by theme.

01Capture what you know

The starting point: deciding what is actually worth recording. The decisions and their reasoning, the lessons from what went wrong, the skills and context that live only in people's heads.

02Organize & store it

Where the knowledge lives and how it is structured. The systems, tools, processes, and policies that hold a record, plus the contracts, privacy rules, and security that protect it.

03Find & reuse it

Knowledge nobody can locate is the same as knowledge nobody has. Making the record searchable and usable: a shared language, the channels and meetings where it flows, and the daily work that draws on it.

04Share it & onboard

Passing knowledge to the next person. Onboarding and development that transfer it deliberately, and the culture, values, and team structures that make sharing the norm rather than a favour.

05Keep it alive

Memory decays unless it is maintained. Keeping the record current, planning for the risk of departures, and handling ownership, succession, recruitment, and cover so knowledge survives the people who hold it.

04.

The library

Search freely or filter by theme. Each card is one facet of the organization with its own page: what to capture, questions to guide the conversation, and things to watch out for.

Filter by theme

Showing all 66 cards

Card 1: Accounting & reporting 1Accounting & reporting Bookkeeping, annual report & tax reporting Money & Finance Card 2: Admin 2Admin From filing receipts to getting train tickets Operations & Process Card 3: Agreements & contracts 3Agreements & contracts What you promised & agreed on, put in ink Governance, Legal & Risk Card 4: Board 4Board Advisors, owners & board of directors Governance, Legal & Risk Card 5: Brand(s) 5Brand(s) Brand manual, logotype & tone of voice Product & Offering Card 6: Bugs & errors 6Bugs & errors Errors in experiences, products & services Product & Offering Card 7: Business concept 7Business concept The core ideas behind the business Strategy & Direction Card 8: Business models 8Business models How you get money & create value Strategy & Direction Card 9: Challenges 9Challenges Hurdles you see or imagine ahead Strategy & Direction Card 10: Communication Channels 10Communication Channels From your website to the instagram account Customers & Market Card 11: Community 11Community Fans, engaged customers & local supporters Customers & Market Card 12: Culture 12Culture Company culture, people & traditions People & Culture Card 13: Customer service 13Customer service Providing support & help to users Customers & Market Card 14: Design 14Design How design shapes the business Product & Offering Card 15: Distribution 15Distribution Warehouses, transport & fulfillment Operations & Process Card 16: Employees 16Employees Contacts, skills & professions People & Culture Card 17: Events 17Events Bigger events like conferences & annual meeting Operations & Process Card 18: Expansion plans 18Expansion plans Road maps & plans for expansion Strategy & Direction Card 19: Future Scenarios 19Future Scenarios Desirable, likely or dark paths ahead Strategy & Direction Card 20: Gender equality 20Gender equality Create equal opportunities for all genders People & Culture Card 21: Glossary 21Glossary Explaining internal jargon & technical language Knowledge & Systems Card 22: Health & well-being 22Health & well-being Help members & employees to be healthy People & Culture Card 23: Hierarchy 23Hierarchy Decisions, formal power & structures Operations & Process Card 24: History 24History Story & background of the company Knowledge & Systems Card 25: Improvements 25Improvements Optimization, automation & upgrades Money & Finance Card 26: Inclusion & diversity 26Inclusion & diversity Making sure everyone acts fair & non-discriminatory People & Culture Card 27: Innovation & creativity 27Innovation & creativity Finding, encouraging & developing new ideas Strategy & Direction Card 28: Intellectual property 28Intellectual property Trademarks, design rights & patents Governance, Legal & Risk Card 29: Internal communication 29Internal communication How you communicate & with what tools Knowledge & Systems Card 30: Knowledge 30Knowledge Knowledge, blueprints, insights & tricks Knowledge & Systems Card 31: Laws & permits 31Laws & permits From legal requirements to getting permits Governance, Legal & Risk Card 32: Market 32Market Markets, competitors & landscape Customers & Market Card 33: Marketing & PR 33Marketing & PR Reaching out to customers, industry & journalists Customers & Market Card 34: Meetings 34Meetings How you conduct meetings & when Operations & Process Card 35: Mission & Vision 35Mission & Vision Your calling & what you want to become Strategy & Direction Card 36: Money & Finance 36Money & Finance Budget, flows & what to expect ahead Money & Finance Card 37: Network 37Network People & organizations you connect with Customers & Market Card 38: Offering 38Offering Services, products & eco-system you offer Product & Offering Card 39: Onboarding 39Onboarding Introducing & onboarding newly employed People & Culture Card 40: Ops & Projects 40Ops & Projects Projects, sprints & tasks Operations & Process Card 41: Ownership 41Ownership People who control or owns the organization Governance, Legal & Risk Card 42: Partnerships 42Partnerships Alliances, collaborations & loose partnerships Customers & Market Card 43: Performance & KPIs 43Performance & KPIs What you want to perform on & how you measure it Money & Finance Card 44: Locations 44Locations Managing offices, stores & factories Operations & Process Card 45: Policies 45Policies Rules & guidelines within the organization Governance, Legal & Risk Card 46: Privacy 46Privacy Data collected & stored about users Governance, Legal & Risk Card 47: Processes 47Processes Methodology & processes Operations & Process Card 48: Procurement 48Procurement Purchasing services, goods & temporary workforce Money & Finance Card 49: Production & supply chain 49Production & supply chain Producing, sourcing & making Operations & Process Card 50: Products 50Products Development, features, pricing & roadmap Product & Offering Card 51: Professional development 51Professional development How employees can grow & progress in their career People & Culture Card 52: Project systems 52Project systems Docs, todos, CRMs & project management Operations & Process Card 53: Recruitment 53Recruitment Attracting, recruiting & employer brand People & Culture Card 54: Research & development 54Research & development Initiatives & development of what's to come Strategy & Direction Card 55: Risks 55Risks Planning, avoiding & mitigating risks & crisis Governance, Legal & Risk Card 56: Sales 56Sales In- & outbound sales & how you close deals Customers & Market Card 57: Security 57Security From physical location to computer systems Governance, Legal & Risk Card 58: Services 58Services Design, experience, flow & touchpoints Product & Offering Card 59: Sustainability 59Sustainability Doing it right (corporate social responsibility) Governance, Legal & Risk Card 60: Teams & divisions 60Teams & divisions How teams are composed & different departments People & Culture Card 61: Tools & Technologies 61Tools & Technologies Digital and analog tools you rely on Knowledge & Systems Card 62: Trends 62Trends Trends that affect now & in the future Strategy & Direction Card 63: User journey 63User journey How users find & experience what you offer Product & Offering Card 64: Users & customers 64Users & customers Those using your product & services Customers & Market Card 65: Vacation & time off 65Vacation & time off Laws & policies around having time off People & Culture Card 66: Values 66Values Values you are guided by Strategy & Direction
05.

About

A library for building organizational memory, built on a card deck that lays the whole company out on the table.

Why

Every organization holds knowledge that is not written down anywhere: the story behind a decision, the informal way a process actually gets done, the person who knows where everything is. MethodKit for Memory & Reminiscence is a deck that lays those parts out together, from strategy and governance to culture, products, and the systems everyone relies on. Here each card gets its own page that asks the same questions: what does this part of the organization look like, what is worth capturing, and who needs to be able to find it?

It is for founders, operators, knowledge managers, and anyone responsible for keeping the organization legible as it grows and changes. The texts are starting points and groundwork, not a bureaucratic checklist to fill out.

How to use it

Pull the cards that feel most at risk, the areas where knowledge is concentrated in one or two people, or where new hires tend to get lost. Use the questions to surface what is not written down, decide what matters most, and agree on where it should live.

Want the cards in your hand? The deck is available from MethodKit.