Specimens

Two Maps, as they arrive.

One for a couple and one for a team, complete. A Map arrives after each person has written privately, read their own Folio first, and approved every line that appears under their name.

These specimens are invented. The people, their words and their circumstances were written for this page. The Maps were composed the way a real Map is: every line traced to something one of them wrote and chose to share. We never publish a real Map, in whole or in part, with or without names.

The Third Field™ · Couples Map

For Hana and Luis

Married six years, with a son, Theo, aged two, and a move across the country last spring · Prepared from two private Reflections

This Map brings together words you each chose to share. The readings and questions are offered for you to consider: you can recognize a part, correct a part, or leave a part aside.

The Prevailing Climate and voices for the plants

Two Saturdays ago you walked the botanic gardens for an hour, Theo asleep in the carrier, talking about nothing. Luis did voices for the plants, and Hana laughed so much she had to sit down on a bench.

What each of you counts as doing well together is a hard time you got through. For Hana, it was the night Theo had croup, when neither of you had to say a word and Luis had the shower running hot before she had found the thermometer. For Luis, it is making each other laugh when it is bad: at the worst of the move, the truck two days late and a mattress on the floor, you still had a good time.

A missed train and a burst pipe

At Marco's birthday party in Logan Square. I'd met Luis twice before. He walked me to the train and then missed his own train back so he could keep talking. I think that was it. He says it was later.
Hana

Honestly I'd say later than Hana would. There was a night about two months in when her pipes burst and she called me before she called the landlord. That was when I thought, OK, this is us.
Luis

The Canopy, talking it through and going blank

When it gets hard, Hana keeps going, wanting to talk it through until it is done and she can stop thinking about it; Luis goes blank, goes quiet, and needs to go away and think. He wrote that from outside it probably looks as if he does not care, the opposite of what is going on.

Keeping going, going quiet, and the walk

Your answers could describe one movement: when Luis goes quiet, Hana keeps going, and when Hana keeps going, Luis goes quiet. To Hana the quiet can feel like a shut door, though she knows it is not always that; Luis describes static, and not finding the words. To Luis the keeping going means she wants an answer right now, before he has one; Hana describes wanting to get to the end of it.

Is that how it goes between you, and when does it not?

To come back, Hana asks for words first; she says a hug is fine afterwards. Luis asks for time, an hour, maybe less, and would rather be the one who comes back to it.

Both of you named the same time it went better: after the daycare argument, you took Theo out in the stroller and talked while you walked; Hana found it easier side by side, Luis that moving helped.

What was different that time: walking, being side by side, having Theo with you, or the time it gave you? Which part could you repeat on an ordinary evening?

The Tillage and what gets done on a Sunday

On Sundays Hana cooks extra and puts Luis's lunches for his long studio days at the back of the fridge, as a way of saying she knows those days are long for him too. On Sunday nights, once Theo is down, Luis does the budget, as his way of saying that money is handled. Both happen on Sunday and neither is easy to see: the lunches go where they do not look like a thing, and Luis writes that Hana sees the totals but not the two hours.

Would either of you want the other to see it, or is it right as it is?

The Uncleared Ground and bedtime

Hana would hand on the weeknight bedtime routine: on the nights she is home she does bath and books, and by then she is running on nothing. Luis would take bedtime every night; he likes it, and it is the only time Theo sits still. Luis wrote that bedtime became his over the winter, without anyone saying so. Each would also keep something: Hana, the calendar, because she likes knowing; Luis, the cooking, which is how he unwinds.

Which nights are these, and which parts: the bath, the books, the rest? If one of you took on those nights, what would change for each of you?

The Fallow, how the day was and a night out

Hana would welcome being asked how her day was before she is handed something, even if the answer is boring. Luis would welcome time for just the two of you, not in the evening when you are both wrecked: a proper night out, even once a month.

Before either becomes a plan: what would it give the one who wants it?

A small party instead of chores, and never once a dentist

Luis does the Sunday reset without being asked, and he puts music on so it feels like a small party instead of chores. I've never actually said thank you for that. Thank you.
From Hana, to Luis

Hana keeps our whole life in her head. Every appointment, every form, Theo's shots, my mum's birthday. I have never once had to remember a dentist. Thank you, really.
From Luis, to Hana

No relay race, no baton

Hana hopes for evenings that do not feel like a relay race, Luis for evenings on the same team instead of handing Theo across like a baton. Both of you reached for the same picture of a handover.

When: An evening that starts to go the way you described, if it does. Either of you can call it.
What you do: Whoever calls it asks for a pause, with a few words and a time to come back to it, at the table or on a walk. Who comes back to it: complete together.
Who decides: The two of you decide whether to try it. Trying it does not mean accepting this Map's reading, and either of you can change or end it at any time.
Exceptions: complete together: evenings when a pause would not fit
Looking back: complete together: when to look at it again. Did you come back to it when you said you would, and did each of you get what you asked for first? Keep it, change it, or drop it?

The Third Field™ · Team Map

For the product team

A product team at a logistics software company, whose plans are often redirected by escalations from Sales · Prepared from the team’s private Reflections

This Map brings together what you chose to share. It offers a reading for you to consider and correct. What is absent should not be taken as evidence that everyone agrees, or that nothing else matters.

At a glance

The work ahead: the answers show a team that ships, and whose plans are often redirected by escalations from Sales. They do not state the outcome the team is responsible for, or the period it covers to confirm in the session.

What to protect: colleagues who cover for each other without being asked, design reviews where engineering shows up and argues, and code reviews that are kind and thorough, among people who like each other.

The priority to address: authority and accountability, in who decides priority when an escalation from Sales lands in the middle of a sprint. And voice and useful difference, in roadmap reviews and retros that several of you describe as holding less than they used to, while design reviews still hold argument.

The decision required: who decides priority when an escalation from Sales lands during a sprint. And, as Sam asked, whether the roadmap is the team's to set or Sales'. The answers do not establish where the authority for that decision sits, or whether part of it lies beyond the team to confirm in the session.

The proposed trial: when an escalation from Sales arrives after a sprint has started, it is brought to an agreed place before anything in the sprint changes, and what moves is settled there in view of the people it touches, with its tradeoff named and its exceptions agreed together.

The review: whether to keep, change or stop the trial rests on whether the work improved, for example with less avoidable rework, and at what cost, for example whether urgent customer needs were still met. It also asks whether the agreed authority held when pressure arrived.

What is worth keeping: covering for each other, and arguing in review

Dana wrote that people here cover for each other without being asked. Ravi named the design reviews, where engineering actually shows up and argues. “That's rare and we have it.” Mei named the code review culture, where people are kind and thorough. Sam put it plainly. “We actually like each other. Nobody here is trying to win.”

Dana would keep the individual meetings with the people on the team, without exception. Sam would never give up the customer calls. Mei would keep mentoring the juniors. Olu would keep the written decision log.

Some of the work here happens out of sight. Sam keeps a running doc of every priority change since January and who asked for it, and hopes it says that someone is keeping track so the team can learn, not to blame anyone. Ravi redoes small bits of UI after release, the spacing and the copy, and hopes it says that the details matter here even when the team is rushing. Olu sends the reasoning behind each ticket to design and engineering before the ticket itself, and hopes it says that their judgement is wanted, not only their hours.

Several of you find the work easiest early, before anything has been promised outside the team.

Quiet in the roadmap review, argument in the design review

Sam wrote that the team has gone a bit quiet in roadmap reviews, and would like to know why as well. Ravi found the recent retros pretty flat. Set beside what works, the roadmap review and the retro are described as quiet or flat, while in design review people argue.

What is different between the roadmap review and a design review, for the people in each?

Several of you asked for things to be said earlier, while there is still time to use them.

Is the quiet in the roadmap review connected to when things reach the room, or is it a separate matter? And what would make saying something early easier, in either direction?

Half of it gone by Wednesday

Sam described planning properly, and then a message from Sales and half the plan gone by Wednesday. Dana called the work productive but brittle: the team ships, but every Sales escalation knocks something loose. Mei was shorter: shipping is fine, and planning is chaos.

Several of you went back to the August billing incident, when who would do what was settled within the hour, in view of the whole team.

What was different that time, and which part of it could the team repeat the next time an escalation knocks the plan loose?

What the team can decide

The sprint freeze was the team's own agreement. Several of you described it holding for a while, and then giving way. Several of you also named who decides priority when an escalation from Sales lands in the middle of a sprint as a decision nobody clearly owns.

Sam asked for a straight answer about whether the roadmap is the team's or Sales'; Sam can work with either, and just wants to know which.

Which of these can the room settle for itself, and which need a decision from the role that holds that authority? Whoever holds it, what would they need, and from whom, for an answer to hold?

Several of you described work that fell between colleagues, each thinking the other had it. Ravi named empty states and error messages, which engineering thinks design owns and Ravi thinks product does.

Which of these gaps could the room give an owner itself?

Several of you named work you would take on. Dana would take on the conversation with Sales leadership about escalations, and wrote that it should sit with Dana properly, where right now it sits with whoever gets the Slack message. Ravi would run a proper design critique for the engineers as well as for design. Mei would happily own the release notes. Olu would own carrier integrations from the contract to going live.

Questions for the room

Several of you said that when a plan changes you start fixing it yourselves, before anyone has asked. Several of you said that when a colleague starts fixing it, you usually go quiet. Could these be the same moment, seen from both ends? If they are, what does the fixing mean to the people doing it, and what does it look like to those who go quiet?

A working agreement to consider: an escalation that does not open the sprint by itself

Several of you would try a rule about who decides.

Dana hoped that a Sales escalation would no longer automatically mean a new sprint. Ravi hoped that design would be in the room when the roadmap changes, not after.

When: When an escalation from Sales arrives after a sprint has started.
What you do: Before anything in the sprint changes, the escalation is brought by complete together: who brings it to complete together: a room, a shared document, or both, and what moves is settled there, in view of the people it touches. The escalation comes with its tradeoff named: what existing work stops, moves or reduces to make room for it.
Who decides: Name the role with authority to approve the tradeoff. Name the route for an escalation that needs a decision from beyond the team.
Exceptions: complete together: which escalations, if any, may still change the sprint directly, and what needs agreeing beyond the team first
Looking back: complete together: when you will look at it again. Did the work improve, for example with less avoidable rework? At what cost: were urgent customer needs still met? Did the agreed authority hold when pressure arrived? Did the people the change touched hear of it before it was treated as decided? Was the tradeoff named each time? Trying this does not mean accepting this Map's reading, and you can change it or end it whenever you choose.

For a team carrying something structural

The Dossier, as a document you can hand to someone.

A Dossier runs longer than a Map: the weather in the room, each friction returned to the field it came from, three questions for the centre of the table, and one protocol to try. The briefing note carries a complete specimen, what it asks of the people in it, what it protects, and what it costs, written to be forwarded to whoever has to agree to it.

Download the specimen Talk to a Director

PDF, seven pages. Nothing to fill in, and no email required.

What to notice

Three things a Map is careful about.

It describes the field, not the people

No sentence describes anyone's character or motives. Where two accounts differ, both are kept, and the connection is offered as a question to check. Everyone can recognize themselves in it without being exposed by it, and a Director decides every line before it is released.

It ends in something you can try

A working agreement with its occasion, what you do, who decides, the exceptions and how you will look back on it. The blanks are yours: we never fill in names, dates or who decides. Trying it does not mean accepting the reading, and you can change or end it.

It is short enough to read together

A Map is meant to be read at a table, in one sitting. Sections appear only where there is something to say; nothing is written to fill a heading. The value is in what survives the editing, and in the questions left for you to answer.

Each person also receives a private Folio, written from their own Reflection alone, before anyone sees the shared Map.

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