Tribe Doctrine

The Tribe Doctrine is your workspace-wide constitution: a set of house rules that apply to every worker across every Company. It’s where you write the principles you want the whole workforce to live by — “always cite sources”, “never promise a date we can’t keep”, “keep it warm and plain” — and the app folds them into each worker’s instructions.

Where a single Worker’s character is personal and a Company OS is local law, the Tribe Doctrine is the law of the land.

The authority stack

When a worker is about to act, the app assembles its instructions in a clear order of authority:

persona → Tribe Doctrine → Company OS → task context

Read top to bottom: first who the worker is, then the workspace-wide doctrine, then the rules of the Company they’re working for, then the specifics of the task at hand. Crucially, the Tribe Doctrine outranks the Company OS — when a workspace rule and a Company rule disagree, the doctrine wins. (The doctrine also takes precedence over a worker’s own persona prompt where they conflict.)

This gives you a dependable mental model: set broad, non-negotiable rules once in the doctrine, and let each Company refine the details beneath them.

Opting a worker out

Sometimes you want a worker outside the cultural fold — a devil’s-advocate, an off-brand brainstormer, a critic who shouldn’t be nudged toward the house line. Any worker can set skip Tribe Doctrine, and the doctrine simply won’t be folded into its instructions. It still lives in the same workspace and under the same safety rails; it just isn’t bound by the house style.

Where to set it

The Tribe Doctrine lives in The Village → ⚙ Tribe settings. Write or edit the rules there; from that moment they apply to every worker on their next run (except those who’ve opted out).

Keep it short and firm

A doctrine works best as a handful of clear, firm rules — the things you’d never want any worker to get wrong. Save the fine-grained guidance for each Company’s OS or the individual task.

Doctrine vs Company OS

Use the Tribe Doctrine for principles that should hold everywhere. Use a Company OS for that Company’s brand, compliance, and vendor choices. When they clash, the doctrine prevails.

In practice

Keep it to a handful of rules. The doctrine rides along in every worker’s instructions on every run, so length has a cost — in tokens and in dilution. Five firm rules are followed more reliably than twenty-five soft ones.

What belongs here: things that must hold everywhere regardless of Company. Never invent facts or figures. Never send anything outward without approval. Say plainly when you don’t know. Cite the source when quoting Library material. These are principles, not brand preferences.

What doesn’t belong here: brand voice, tone words, banned words, vendor choices, per-client rules. Those go in the relevant Company OS — putting them in the doctrine applies one client’s voice to every other client’s work.

Remember it wins conflicts. When a Company setting appears to be ignored, the doctrine is the usual culprit. That precedence is deliberate — workspace-wide safety rules should outrank any single team’s preferences — but it does mean an over-broad doctrine rule can quietly override Company settings everywhere.

Terms in this page

• Tribe Doctrine — workspace-wide house rules folded into every worker’s instructions; the top cultural authority.
• Worker / persona — a configured AI character governed by the doctrine; see Workers.
• Company — a top-level team container; the doctrine applies across all of them. See Companies.
• Company OS — a single Company’s own rules (brand, compliance, vendors); outranked by the Tribe Doctrine.
• Authority stack — the order in which instructions are layered: persona → Tribe Doctrine → Company OS → task context.
• Persona prompt — a worker’s own base instructions; the doctrine takes precedence where they conflict.
• Task context — the specifics of the job a worker is doing, the most local layer.
• Skip Tribe Doctrine — a per-worker setting that exempts it from the doctrine.
• The Village — the workspace view where the Tribe Doctrine is configured (under ⚙ Tribe settings).