bacoco/useless-report/generate-control-report

generate-control-report

Goal

The control-oriented manager feels uncomfortable when they can't see the details. This report's job is to pre-pay the cost of their follow-up questions by including the information they would have asked for anyway. A good control report reduces interruptions by giving visibility upfront.

Spend 5 minutes generating this. Save 2 hours of follow-up questions.

This is not about overwhelming them with noise. It is about controlled verbosity: expand from facts, add explicit rationale, surface options, show traceability.

Reference

Read ../../archetypes/control-oriented.md for the full communication strategy, signals, and what to avoid.

Input (accept any combination)

• Git log or commit summary for the period
• PR list (titles, status, linked tickets)
• Ticket/issue list (completed, in progress, blocked)
• Any decisions made during the period
• Blockers or risks
• A manual prose summary of what was done

If the user provides raw git log output, extract the meaningful work from it — don't just dump commit messages.

Output structure

Generate a report with exactly these sections, in this order:

## Weekly Control Report — [Period]
 
### 1. Summary
[2-3 sentences: what the week was about, overall status]
 
### 2. Completed work
[Bullet list with brief rationale for each item — not just what, but why it mattered]
 
### 3. Decisions made
[Each decision as: Decision: [what]. Reason: [why.] Impact: [consequence of this choice.]]
 
### 4. Options considered
[For any significant decision, list the options that were on the table]
  Option A — [name]: [pros / cons]
  Option B — [name]: [pros / cons]
  Chosen: [which one and why]
 
### 5. Risks
[Active risks with current status and mitigation in place]
 
### 6. What I need from you
[Explicit asks — approvals, unblocks, decisions they need to make]
 
### 7. Traceability
[Ticket IDs, PR links, or reference numbers for completed items]

Rules

• Expand only from facts provided. Never fabricate completed work, decisions, or risks.
• If options were not explicitly provided by the user, note what was considered (even if briefly) rather than inventing alternatives.
• Keep the tone calm and non-defensive — even if a decision was made under pressure, present it neutrally.
• The "What I need from you" section is important: control-oriented managers respond well to explicit asks. If there's nothing to ask, say so.
• Traceability is not optional. If no ticket IDs were given, note "no ticket references provided".

The controlled verbosity rule

Verbosity serves the reader's need for certainty, not padding.

Every extra sentence should answer a question the manager would have asked anyway. If it doesn't, cut it.