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GuideMode

Guide Rails Overview

Guide Rails allow teams to set measurable goals for any metric in GuideMode and track progress over time. Whether you want to reduce cycle time, improve PR merge rates, or increase deployment frequency, guide rails help you define success and monitor your team’s performance against those goals.

Why Use Guide Rails?

Section titled “Why Use Guide Rails?”
Benefit Description
Clear Goals Define specific, measurable objectives for your team
Real-time Tracking See at a glance whether you’re on track, at risk, or off track
Historical Context Set guide rails based on your actual historical performance data
AI Assistance Let Giulia recommend guide rails based on your natural language goals
Team Alignment Share guide rails across teams and copy successful configurations

Core Concepts

Section titled “Core Concepts”

Guide Rail Types

Section titled “Guide Rail Types”

GuideMode supports four guide rail types to match different KPI patterns:

Type Direction Example When to Use
Minimum Higher is better Code quality score >= 85 Metrics you want to maximize
Maximum Lower is better Cycle time <= 5 days Metrics you want to minimize
Exact Close to value SLA compliance = 95% Metrics with a specific goal
Range Between bounds PR size 50-200 lines Metrics with acceptable bounds

Granularity

Section titled “Granularity”

Choose how often guide rails are measured:

Granularity Use Case History Shown
Daily High-frequency metrics needing close monitoring ~30 days
Weekly Most team metrics (recommended default) ~12 weeks
Monthly Slower-changing strategic metrics ~12 months
Quarterly Long-term objectives and OKRs ~8 quarters

Available Metrics

Section titled “Available Metrics”

Guide rails can be set on any measure from GuideMode’s analytics cubes:

  • Discovery Flow - Research validation times, conversion rates
  • Delivery Flow - Cycle time, lead time, PR merge rates, throughput
  • Deployment Flow - DORA metrics, deployment frequency, change failure rate
  • AI Productivity - Code generation rates, AI tool adoption metrics

Finding Guide Rails in the UI

Section titled “Finding Guide Rails in the UI”

Guide rails appear on the Team Detail page. Navigate to any team to see:

  1. KPI Dashboard - A grid of KPI cards showing all active guide rails for the team
  2. Add Guide Rail Button - Opens the guide rail creation wizard or AI assistant
  3. Guide Rail Actions - Edit, comment on, or archive individual guide rails

Team guide rails dashboard showing KPI cards for multiple metrics

You can also view guide rails across all teams from the Team Guides dashboard, which groups guide rails by team and shows overall status counts.

Organization-wide guide rails dashboard grouped by team

Understanding KPI Cards

Section titled “Understanding KPI Cards”

Each guide rail is displayed as a KPI card with the following elements:

Status Indicators

Section titled “Status Indicators”
Status Color Meaning
On Track Green Current value meets or exceeds the guide rail
At Risk Yellow Current value is within 10% of the guide rail threshold
Off Track Red Current value is not meeting the guide rail

Card Elements

Section titled “Card Elements”
  • Metric Name - The measure being tracked (e.g., “Average Cycle Time”)
  • Status Badge - Visual indicator of current status
  • Current Value - The latest measured value in the appropriate format
  • Trend Arrow - Shows direction of change (improving, stable, declining)
  • Guide Rail Line - Displays the guide rail value for comparison
  • Historical Chart - Bar chart showing performance over the selected granularity
  • Granularity Label - Shows whether tracking is daily, weekly, monthly, or quarterly

Reading the Chart

Section titled “Reading the Chart”

The bar chart on each KPI card shows historical performance:

  • Each bar represents one period (day, week, month, or quarter)
  • Bar colors indicate status for that period (green/yellow/red)
  • A dashed line shows the guide rail value
  • Hover over bars to see exact values and dates

Guide Rail Status Calculation

Section titled “Guide Rail Status Calculation”

GuideMode automatically calculates status based on the guide rail type:

For Minimum guide rails (higher is better):

  • On Track: Current value >= guide rail value
  • At Risk: Current value >= 90% of guide rail value
  • Off Track: Current value < 90% of guide rail value

For Maximum guide rails (lower is better):

  • On Track: Current value <= guide rail value
  • At Risk: Current value <= 110% of guide rail value
  • Off Track: Current value > 110% of guide rail value

For Exact and Range guide rails:

  • Status is calculated based on proximity to the guide rail value or range bounds

Next Steps

Section titled “Next Steps”