Evidence Grading Skill

"We have evidence" covers everything from a randomized experiment to the CEO's seatmate on a flight — and decisions made on ungraded evidence inherit the confusion. The grading discipline: inventory what actually supports the claim, place each item on the business-evidence hierarchy (what it is, not how confident it feels), test the graded weight against the decision's stakes (a reversible pilot needs less than a one-way rebrand — decision-journal logic), and when evidence falls short, name the cheapest upgrade — because the answer to weak evidence is usually a better test, not a braver bet.

What This Skill Produces

• The evidence inventory — everything supporting (and contradicting) the claim, each item graded on the hierarchy
• The weight assessment — what the graded pile actually supports, including the mixed-signals honest read
• The sufficiency verdict — enough for this decision's stakes / not yet — with the stakes analysis shown
• The upgrade path — the cheapest next evidence that would move the verdict ("a 2-week holdout test settles this for $0")

Required Inputs

Ask for these if not provided:

• The claim and the decision riding on it — "users want X" feeding a backlog item vs. feeding a repositioning are different sufficiency bars; the decision's reversibility and cost set the bar
• The evidence, itemized — every piece: the data pull, the survey, the five customer quotes, the competitor's move, the expert's opinion — including the inconvenient items (an inventory that omits contradicting evidence is advocacy)
• The evidence's provenance — n, selection, dates, who collected it and with what incentive (source-triangulation supplies the externals; internal evidence has incentives too)

Framework: The Grading Rules