Core concepts

TOW is an operating workspace for company context, daily execution, durable knowledge, and AI-assisted review. It is designed so important facts become visible workspace state instead of staying buried in chat messages, meeting notes, or private memory.

This page introduces the concepts you will see throughout the product.

Workspace and organisation

A workspace belongs to an organisation. The organisation contains members, groups, projects, docs, memory, tickets, decisions, risks, snapshots, and AI review items.

The first account created on a new TOW server becomes the first organisation owner and server admin. After that, most people join through an organisation invite.

Concept	What it means
Organisation	The company-level workspace and membership boundary.
Member	A person who belongs to the organisation.
Group	A reusable set of members for shared access patterns.
Role	The permission level a person has in the organisation or in a project.
Server admin	A server-level administrator who can manage server settings.

Workflow modes

TOW supports two operating modes.

Mode	Use it when
Founder	A founder or very small leadership group wants a direct operating loop for focus, strategy, technical judgment, and visible execution.
Organization	A team needs shared accountability, project access, role-based work ownership, and more formal collaboration.

You choose a mode during onboarding. Organisation admins can change it later in Organisation Settings.

note

Hidden gotcha: Changing workflow mode adjusts how TOW frames prompts and operating guidance. It does not rewrite your docs, tickets, or existing memory. Review active priorities and open decisions after a mode change so the workspace still reflects how you intend to run.

Projects and scope

Projects let one organisation separate work by product, customer implementation, initiative, or team. The project picker in the app shell controls the active scope for many pages.

Use All Projects for company-wide review. Choose a specific project when the work, docs, memory, tickets, decisions, risks, snapshots, or chat conversation should stay focused on that project.

note

Project scope: If a page looks empty or an AI answer seems too narrow, check the project picker first. You may be viewing a specific project instead of All Projects.

Project visibility and grants affect what people can see and do:

Project access	What to expect
Open project	Organisation members can usually read and work in the project.
Restricted project	Members need a direct grant, a group grant, or elevated organisation privileges.
Viewer	Can read project content but should not be expected to update execution state.
Member	Can contribute to project work.
Lead or admin	Can manage project settings, access, workflow, boards, and fields.

Organisation owners, organisation admins, and server admins have broad access across projects.

Memory

Memory is the durable set of facts TOW uses when it answers questions, generates snapshots, reviews work, and proposes updates. Memory should be specific, current, and reviewable.

Examples of useful memory:

• Current priorities.
• Active blockers.
• Important customer facts.
• Technical architecture decisions.
• Explicit non-goals.
• Risks, constraints, and assumptions.

Memory can come from onboarding, docs, project Check-Ins, chat, and other workspace activity. AI can propose changes, but people should review those changes before treating them as true.

caution

AI review: Do not treat newly generated memory, tickets, roadmap changes, or snapshot text as canonical until a person has reviewed it. TOW is strongest when AI proposes and people approve.

Docs, tickets, decisions, and risks

TOW separates different kinds of company state so each item has the right home.

Area	Use it for
Docs	Long-form context, plans, research, process, and source material.
Tickets	Track execution work, blockers, progress, ownership, and status.
Decisions	Record judgment calls, options, tradeoffs, and outcomes.
Risks	Track uncertainty, severity, mitigation, and review status.
Memory	Store concise durable facts that AI and workspace views should rely on.

When in doubt, write the full context in Docs first, then let TOW propose memory or work updates from that source.

Snapshots

A snapshot is a human-reviewed summary of the current company or project state. Snapshots help TOW answer with a trusted baseline instead of relying only on recent activity.

Snapshots can be generated for different purposes, such as current company state, daily summary, weekly review, CTO state, or strategy state. A snapshot becomes trusted only after activation.

caution

Review-sensitive action: Activating a snapshot makes it the current trusted summary for that scope. Read and edit the snapshot before activation, especially after onboarding or a major strategy change.

Today and the operating loop

TOW works best when teams use a steady operating loop:

1. Capture the baseline during onboarding.
2. Review and activate the first snapshot.
3. Use Today to review focus, blockers, proposals, and roadmap state.
4. Use project Check-Ins to record what changed.
5. Review Inbox before accepting proposed memory or work changes.
6. Ask Chat questions grounded in the workspace.

Today is the operating cockpit. Project Check-Ins are configured by project admins and appear when due. Inbox is the review queue.

Agent Runs

Some AI work happens in the background. You may see status such as Agents idle, Agent running, queued, or running. Background runs can generate snapshots, process check-ins, extract memory diffs, review docs, update Today, or scan tickets.

info

Job queues: If a result is not visible immediately, wait for active Agent Runs to finish and refresh the affected page. Background work is per user, and completed jobs are retained only briefly in status indicators.

Role availability

Most product areas are available to signed-in organisation members who can access the active organisation and selected project. Administrative settings require elevated roles.

Role	Common availability
Member	Use Today, Chat, Docs, Memory, Tickets, Decisions, Risks, Snapshots, and Inbox where project access allows.
Organisation admin	Manage organisation settings, members, invites, groups, and most project-level administration.
Organisation owner	Full organisation administration, including ownership-level member management.
Project lead or project admin	Manage a specific project's settings, access, workflow, boards, and fields.
Server admin	Manage server settings and has broad administrative access across the server.

Access can still be narrowed by project scope, restricted projects, and workspace policy.