Deck Journal Field Guide Killhouse
Instrument · 01

Deck

Fifty-two cards. Four suits. One question per card. The practitioner instrument. Pulled when a question is needed — when something is surfacing and needs surfacing more deliberately.

Cards
52
Suits
A · X · I · S
Use
Non-linear · on-demand
A · 04Alignment
"What do we say we believe when no one is taking notes?"
F04 / 13
I · 08Identity
"Who would walk in today and recognize what we are?"
F08 / 13
S · 11Self
"Where have we drifted from what we set out to be?"
F11 / 13
What it is

A working deck. Pulled, not played.

Deck is the surface-on-demand instrument of the Foundership practice. Fifty-two cards. One question per card. The operator pulls one when a question is needed — when something is surfacing in the work, the team, or the founder's own thinking, and needs surfacing more deliberately.

Each card is sized to be carried. Each question is sized to be sat with for fifteen minutes or an hour, in writing, alone or with someone the operator trusts. The cards are not divination. They are a stocked set of questions an operator can reach for when the right question hasn't arrived on its own.

Pull when something is surfacing. Sit with what surfaces.

How it works

Four suits. One per AXIS phase.

The deck is structured by the AXIS architecture. Thirteen cards per suit. Each suit holds the questions appropriate to one phase of the work — Alignment, Execution, Identity, Self. The operator can pull from a single suit when they know which phase they're working in, or pull blind from the full deck when they don't.

A
Suit · Alignment

What do we believe?

Questions that surface the belief the organization exists to protect. Naming the territory. Stripping the map of the things it doesn't carry.

13 cards
X
Suit · eXecution

Are we building around it?

Questions that surface whether the belief is operational. The hire. The budget. The calendar. What's being rewarded. What's being tolerated.

13 cards
I
Suit · Identity

Who are we now?

Questions that surface self-recognition through structure. Not who we say we are. Who the structure says we are when no one is performing.

13 cards
S
Suit · Self

Are we still who we set out to be?

Questions that assume drift. Expect fatigue. Re-center the work on belief. The recursive return that the discipline depends on.

13 cards
Sample questions

Four pulls. One from each suit.

The questions are sharp because the work is sharp. They are designed to be sat with, not answered. The operator who pulls them is the operator who answers them.

A · 03
"What would you say you stand for if no employee would ever read the answer?"
Alignment
X · 07
"Which decision this quarter contradicts what you say you protect?"
eXecution
I · 02
"What would a stranger conclude about you from your last ninety days of calendar entries?"
Identity
S · 09
"Where have you stopped tending what you said you were here to tend?"
Self
Who it's for

Three operators. Same deck.

The deck travels well between solo practice, team practice, and facilitated practice. The same fifty-two cards do their work in each.

Mode 01

Solo practice

The founder pulls a card weekly. Sits with the question for thirty minutes. Writes what surfaces. The deck becomes the operator's standing surface-on-demand instrument.

Mode 02

Leadership team

The team pulls a card to open a quarterly review or a retreat. The question becomes the structure of the conversation. The deck holds the operator's role steady so the work can do its own work.

Mode 03

Consultant or coach

The advisor uses the deck with a client. The card structures the engagement without the advisor performing intuition. The framework names what the conversation surfaces.

What you get

A printed deck. Built for the desk and the carry.

Deck is delivered as a fifty-two-card printed instrument in a sleeved box. Card stock is heavy enough to outlast a year of pulls and shuffles. The questions are printed in serif italic at a size the operator can read from across a desk.

Cards
52 · four suits of 13 · A / X / I / S
Card size
63 × 88 mm · standard poker trim
Stock
350 gsm matte coated · linen finish
Box
Sleeved tuck case · uncoated black with foil crest
Edition
v1.0 · 2026 · Foundership Institute
Price
$149 · single deck · ships when restocked
License
Single-deck retail · cohort orders · partner-branded co-edition
Sequence
Pulled on demand · works with no instruction · pairs with Journal for the year-long arc
Where it stands

A stocked set of questions. Not divination.

The deck draws on three traditions and refuses a fourth. From cognitive-therapy practice it borrows the disciplined use of structured prompts. From military and operator-level instruction it borrows the principle that a question worked is worth more than a lecture given. From coaching practice it borrows the form of the card as a held object. It refuses divination — the cards do not predict; they prompt.

Korzybski · 1933
Science and Sanity
Each card is a question that surfaces the gap between what the operator says and what their decisions reveal. The map versus territory test, on a card.
Schein · 1999, 2010
Process Consultation & Organizational Culture
Questions, not answers. The consultant's load-bearing instrument is the question that brings the client's own thinking to the surface. The deck makes this portable.
Argyris & Schön · 1974
Theory in Practice
Each pulled card stresses the say/do gap. The deck's working assumption is that operators rarely pull a card and find their espoused theory and theory-in-use already aligned.
Boyd · OODA loop notes
Observe, orient, decide, act
The deck operates in the orient phase. A pull is a deliberate orientation move — a check on what the operator is seeing before the decision is made.
Also in the practice

One spine. Four instruments.

Order the Deck. $149.

52 cards. Four suits. Hand-finished tuck case with wax-seal closure. Do not reshuffle discomfort. Single decks ship when restocked. Cohort orders, advisor networks, and partner-branded co-editions on the licensing path.