Panel · Template
Go / No-Go Board.
LiveGo / No-Go BoardPut a proposal in front of a board of specialists who each score the same criteria independently, and get back a recommendation with explicit conditions, the score matrix and vote, the dissent, and what would reverse the call.
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When to use it
A proposal needs a go or no-go before money, people or a commitment follow, and you want it scored against stated criteria with the dissent recorded.
Who it is for. Leads who prepare a decision for a named decider: development, business development, access, evidence, quality, regulatory and brand leads.
Why a gate must not be a ritual
Gate meetings can become rubber stamps, with unclear roles, weak information and criteria that do not discriminate. A gate is a decision point with a defined set of outcomes: go, kill, hold or recycle. This template offers four outcomes, not a bare yes or no, separates must-meet criteria from weighted ones so that a failed minimum cannot be averaged away, has every seat score before seeing the others, and records dissent and the conditions attached.1,2
What you get
The proposal and the decision sought. What is proposed, the gate it must pass, the options on the table including a smaller or later commitment, the named human decider and the evidence supplied.1
A recommendation with conditions. One of go, conditional go, hold or recycle, or no-go, with the vote, the number of must-meet criteria failed or unscored, and the reasons that carried it.1,2
Criteria and scoring basis. Each criterion, whether it is must-meet or should-meet, the evidence that would justify each score, and the thresholds, which the proposer or decider sets and the seats do not invent. A minimum bar, a target bar and a zone between them for the data.3,4,6
Seat assessments, score matrix and vote. Each seat scores every criterion with a basis and a citation or gap and casts a vote. The matrix shows the spread for each criterion and not only the mean, and shows cells with no basis as not scored.8
Conditions, dissent and the pre-mortem. A table of conditions with owner and consequence if unmet, a table of dissent with what would change the call, and at Full depth a pre-mortem and the outcome of a rebuttal round.5,7
What is in it, by length
| Section | Brief | Standard | Comprehensive |
|---|---|---|---|
| The proposal and the decision soughtThe proposal, the options and the decider | ● | ● | ● |
| Board recommendationThe outcome, the vote and the reasons | ● | ● | ● |
| Criteria and scoring basisThe criteria, the scales and the thresholds | – | ● | ● |
| Seat assessmentsEach seat’s scores, vote and conditions | ● | ● | ● |
| Score matrix and vote tallyThe scores, the spread and the vote | ● | ● | ● |
| Conditions of approvalWhat must be true or done, by whom and by when | – | ● | ● |
| Pre-mortem and rebuttal outcomeHow the decision fails, and which scores moved | – | – | ● |
| Dissent and what would reverse the callThe dissent and the evidence that would change the call | ● | ● | ● |
A Light report has three seats and about two pages. Standard has four seats and adds the criteria table and the conditions. Full has five seats and adds the pre-mortem and the rebuttal outcome.
Choosing a length
Choose Standard for most decisions. Choose Full when the decision is costly to reverse, so that the pre-mortem and the rebuttal are shown.
The standards and practice behind it
The structure and the checks come from published work on stage-gate decisions, decision criteria, multi-criteria analysis and bias in group decisions. These are the references we drew on and what we took from each. None of their authors has reviewed the template.
| What we took | From | Where it shows |
|---|---|---|
| Treat a gate as a go, kill, hold or recycle decision, judged on readiness and value, and guard against gates becoming rituals | Stage-Gate International, How to Rescue a Gate Meeting and Improving Go/Kill Decision Culture1,2 | Four outcomes and a report that states what was conditioned or stopped and why |
| Agree go and no-go criteria as benchmarks for each phase before the data arrive | The EUPATI Toolbox, criteria for go/no-go decisions3 | Thresholds set in advance by the proposer or the decider |
| Define go, consider and no-go zones against a statistical bar and a clinically meaningful bar | BOP2-DC: Bayesian optimal phase II designs with dual-criterion decision making (arXiv)4 | A minimum bar, a target bar and a zone between them |
| Ask whether dissent was present and explored, where the numbers came from, and run a pre-mortem | Before You Make That Big Decision (Kahneman, Lovallo and Sibony, Harvard Business Review, 2011)5 | The dissent table and the pre-mortem at Full depth |
| Define criteria, scales and weights before scoring, and show the performance matrix | The ISPOR MCDA Emerging Good Practices Task Force, Report 2 (Marsh and colleagues, 2016)6 | The criteria table and the score matrix, visible and justified |
| Organize pharma gate criteria around a few named determinants such as target, safety, patient and commercial potential | Lessons learned from the fate of AstraZeneca’s drug pipeline: a five-dimensional framework (Cook and colleagues, 2014)7 | Few criteria, named in advance and tied to the stage |
| Have each AI seat score alone first, because debate drifts toward agreement | Peacemaker or Troublemaker: How Sycophancy Shapes Multi-Agent Debate (arXiv, 2025)8 | Independent first-pass scores and the spread shown in the matrix |
What it will not do
It does not decide. The decision belongs to the named human decider, and the seats are AI specialists.
It does not set thresholds or weights for you. The proposer or the decider sets them.
It does not average away a failed must-meet criterion.
References
- [1] Stage-Gate International. How to Rescue a Gate Meeting. Read in the template research: gate meeting failure modes and the six-criterion scorecard.
- [2] Stage-Gate International. Improving Go/Kill Decision Culture. Read in the template research. The must-meet and should-meet vocabulary does not appear on these pages and is treated as a design choice.
- [3] EUPATI Toolbox. Criteria for go/no-go decisions. Read in the template research.
- [4] BOP2-DC: Bayesian optimal phase II designs with dual-criterion decision making. arXiv:2112.10880. Read in the template research via an ar5iv copy; author names were not verified.
- [5] Kahneman, D., Lovallo, D. and Sibony, O. Before You Make That Big Decision. Harvard Business Review, June 2011. Summary at Farnam Street. Secondary summary; the HBR original was not read.
- [6] Marsh, K. et al. Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis for Health Care Decision Making: Emerging Good Practices: Report 2 of the ISPOR MCDA Emerging Good Practices Task Force. Value in Health, 2016;19(2):125–137. Abstract only; the body was not read.
- [7] Cook, D. et al. Lessons learned from the fate of AstraZeneca’s drug pipeline: a five-dimensional framework. Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, 2014;13:419–431. Known from the PubMed listing and search summaries; the paper was not read.
- [8] Yao et al. Peacemaker or Troublemaker: How Sycophancy Shapes Multi-Agent Debate. arXiv:2509.23055, 27 September 2025. Abstract read on 8 October 2026.
Links checked 9 October 2026
These are the sources the template drew on. None of their authors or issuers has reviewed it.
About the Panel service
Each panelist answers in their own voice, then the discussion is drawn together. You get the question and who was in the room, every position in full, what they agreed on, where they split, and what follows. Disagreements are written down rather than smoothed into a consensus nobody actually holds, because the split is usually the part you needed.
Use cases for the Go / No-Go Board
7 ready-to-run use cases. Each opens its own page with the question, the specialists, the standards and the references.
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