Decisions · Layer 1
Who should own loyalty
Give one accountable owner authority over the member promise, economics, and operating decisions, with finance, product, data, and service as named control partners. A committee cannot replace a person who decides when the promise changes.
## The decision boundary
Treat this as an operating decision with a member promise, an economic owner, and a measurable failure mode. Keep the qualifying event, reward or benefit, ledger state, service response, and review trigger separate.
## The options
### Conservative control
Choose this when exposure is hard to reverse. The cost is less flexibility and more friction.
### Targeted control
Choose this when risk is concentrated in a rule, cohort, or event. The cost is more tracking and exception handling.
### Full change
Choose this when the current promise or operating model cannot be repaired. The cost is migration, communication, and a new baseline.
## What it costs you
The currency is liability, margin, trust, engineering time, or operating capacity. In a hypothetical illustration, 400 qualifying events earn 2 points each, creating 800 points. At 1 cent per point, that is 8 dollars of stated value. The arithmetic illustrates how an event, balance, and cost connect. It is not a claim about any programme.
Five distinct data points must remain visible: the qualifying event, the benefit or reward rule, the owner of the cost, the member remedy, and the review trigger. An aggregate outcome cannot explain which one failed.
## How to decide
1. Name the behaviour or obligation the rule must control. 2. Identify the evidence that proves the event and the owner who approves exceptions. 3. Price member, operating, and liability cost separately. 4. Choose the least complex control that protects the least reversible outcome. 5. Set the evidence that causes review.
## What breaks
The failure mode is a rule that measures its own success. A reward can issue cleanly and still pay for the wrong event. Keep source evidence, eligibility, issuance, adjustment, fulfilment, and recovery separately observable.