Outcomes per Party

Spell out what each affected person gains, loses, fears, and would call success.

The house you're about to buy is "good for the family," everyone agrees. Except the phrase is hiding four different ledgers: the kids gain a yard and school stability, you gain space and inherit a 70-minute commute, your spouse gains a dream kitchen and a heavier mortgage's anxiety, and your future selves lose the liquidity to change jobs. One sentence, four very different deals.

Outcomes per Party makes each stakeholder's benefits, burdens, risks, and success criteria explicit. The cue: a decision described with one collective outcome when the people involved will experience it differently. The operation: for each person on your list, answer the move question, what does this party gain, lose, fear, and call success? Write it as a short grid, one row per person, even for people who can't speak for themselves, like young kids or your 60-year-old selves. What changes when it works: hidden costs surface while they can still shape the choice, and "good for the family" becomes a negotiated package rather than an assumption. One caution from the spec: don't treat stated preferences as the whole story; what someone says they want may not fully represent their welfare or their rights.