Team Rituals
Design named, templated team rituals that drive a specific behavior—not vague “more meetings”—using Lenny-guest golden-ritual patterns.
Overview
team-rituals is an agent skill most often used in Build (also Grow support, Operate iterate) that helps you design named, templated golden rituals tied to a specific team outcome.
Install
npx skills add https://github.com/refoundai/lenny-skills --skill team-ritualsWhat is this skill?
- Golden rituals framework: named, templated, and known by every employee’s first Friday
- Starts from the behavior or outcome the ritual must drive—not calendar filler
- Draws on 2 Lenny podcast guests (Lane Shackleton, Shishir Mehrotra) with cited ritual examples
- Personalizable ritual recipes (e.g., Catalyst, Dory, Tag-ups, Flash Tags) beyond generic culture talk
- Operational efficiency and culture transmission through repeatable templates
- 3 rules of golden rituals
- 2 guest sources with 2 mentions in the pack
Adoption & trust: 1.2k installs on skills.sh; 1k GitHub stars; 3/3 security scanners passed (skills.sh audits).
What problem does it solve?
Your team’s communication feels ad hoc and you cannot name which recurring practice actually moves decisions, trust, or execution speed.
Who is it for?
Founders forming their first rituals library or refreshing cadences after early hires.
Skip if: One-person shops with no collaborators yet, or enterprises that already enforce a fixed rituals playbook with no design latitude.
When should I use this skill?
Someone is building team culture, creating recurring team practices, improving team communication, or establishing operational rhythms.
What do I get? / Deliverables
You leave with a small set of named, templated rituals anchored to a clear behavioral goal—not a bloated meeting schedule.
- Short list of named ritual candidates with templates
- Outcome-to-ritual mapping using the golden rituals framework
Recommended Skills
Journey fit
Spans multiple journey phases - primary shelf plus alternate fits below.
Ritual design is product and org craft you set up while building the team and product operating system. The skill coaches PM-style cadence: goal → golden rituals rules → concrete ritual templates from two product leaders.
Where it fits
Name and template a weekly decision forum before your second engineer starts.
Add a customer-signal ritual so support themes reach product without another status meeting.
Retrofit a post-incident tag-up ritual so fixes stick after production fires.
How it compares
Use instead of brainstorming vague team-building activities—this skill enforces the three golden-ritual rules and outcome-first framing.
Common Questions / FAQ
Who is team-rituals for?
Product-minded solo builders and leads designing team culture, recurring practices, and operational rhythms with Lenny-style guest frameworks.
When should I use team-rituals?
Use it in Build PM when standing up team cadence, in Grow when scaling support and alignment rituals, and in Operate when iterating how the team learns from incidents and priorities.
Is team-rituals safe to install?
It is advisory content with no shell or network requirements, but review the Security Audits panel on this Prism page like any third-party skill.
SKILL.md
READMESKILL.md - Team Rituals
# Designing Team Rituals - All Guest Insights *2 guests, 2 mentions* --- ## Lane Shackleton *Lane Shackleton* > "I think the rituals that I've been writing down are very personal. They're my take on how to do this." **Insight:** The guest argues that rituals are the 'engine' of a great team and discusses several specific ones (Catalyst, Dory, Tag-ups, Flash Tags) that go beyond simple meeting management or culture building. ## Shishir Mehrotra *Shishir Mehrotra* > "Great companies has a very small list of golden rituals. And there are three rules of golden rituals. Number one, they're named. Number two, every employee knows them by their first Friday and, number three, they're templated." **Insight:** The guest provides a specific framework for 'Golden Rituals' (Named, Templated, Known by First Friday) and discusses how they are the primary vehicle for culture and operational efficiency. --- name: team-rituals description: Help users design effective team rituals. Use when someone is building team culture, creating recurring team practices, trying to improve team communication, or establishing operational rhythms for their organization. --- # Designing Team Rituals Help the user design effective team rituals using frameworks and insights from 2 product leaders. ## How to Help When the user asks for help with team rituals: 1. **Understand the goal** - Ask what behavior or outcome they want the ritual to drive 2. **Apply the golden rituals framework** - Ensure rituals are named, templated, and known by every employee's first Friday 3. **Design for specificity** - Help create rituals that go beyond generic meetings to drive specific outcomes 4. **Plan for adoption** - Discuss how the ritual will be introduced and maintained over time ## Core Principles ### Great companies have a small list of golden rituals Shishir Mehrotra: "Great companies have a very small list of golden rituals. And there are three rules: they're named, every employee knows them by their first Friday, and they're templated." Rituals are the primary vehicle for culture and operational efficiency. ### Rituals are the engine of a great team Lane Shackleton: "The rituals that I've been writing down are very personal. They're my take on how to do this." Go beyond simple meeting management to create rituals like Catalyst sessions, Dory Q&A, Tag-ups, and Flash Tags that serve specific purposes. ### Name your rituals A named ritual becomes a shared concept that can be referenced and improved. "Let's do a Catalyst" is more powerful than "let's brainstorm" because it carries specific expectations. ### Template your rituals Provide structure so anyone can run the ritual consistently. Templates reduce friction and ensure quality even when the ritual creator isn't present. ### Teach rituals early If a new employee doesn't learn your golden rituals in their first week, they'll develop their own habits that may not align with team culture. ## Questions to Help Users - "What outcome are you trying to drive with this ritual?" - "What will you call this ritual - what's its name?" - "Can someone run this ritual with just a template, without you being present?" - "How will new team members learn this ritual in their first week?" - "Is this ritual solving a real problem, or is it just another meeting?" - "What existing rituals could this replace or enhance?" ## Common Mistakes to Flag - **Too many rituals** - Great companies have a small list of golden rituals, not dozens of meetings - **Unnamed rituals** - Without a name, a ritual can't become part of the culture's vocabulary - **No template** - Rituals without structure degrade in quality over time - **Late introduction** - Rituals learned after someone's first week are much harder to adopt - **Generic meetings disguised as rituals** - A ritual should have a specific purpose beyond "staying aligned" ## Deep Dive For all 2 insights from 2 guests, see `references/guest-insights.md` ## Related Skills