OW-04
Team-Level Assignee Coverage — Unassigned WIP Proportion
Ownership
Default severity: medium
ProcessOutputQualityRisk
What it detects
More than the configured proportion of a team\'s in-progress issues have no assignee — the team has a systemic ownership discipline problem, not just isolated incidents. At high proportions, WIP tracking per person is impossible and the team cannot be meaningfully capacity-planned.
Detection formula
FOR each_team T: active_issues(T) = issues WHERE status IN active_statuses AND team=T unassigned_active(T) = COUNT(active_issues WHERE assignee IS NULL) unassigned_pct(T) = unassigned_active(T) / max(1, COUNT(active_issues(T))) IF unassigned_pct(T) > config.ow.unassigned_warning_pct // default: 0.10 (10%) THEN FLAG IF unassigned_pct(T) > config.ow.unassigned_critical_pct // default: 0.20 (20%) THEN CRITICAL Report: unassigned_pct per team ranked descendingExamples in practice
- A team shows more than the configured proportion of a team\'s in-progress issues have no assignee while unassigned warning pct is set to 0.10 (10%).
- Example signal: More than the configured proportion of a team\'s in-progress issues have no assignee — the team has a systemic ownership discipline problem, not just isolated incidents.
Suggested response
Clarify ownership at handoffs and ensure active and done items have an accountable assignee.
Coaching playbook
Symptom
More than the configured proportion of a team\'s in-progress issues have no assignee — the team has a systemic ownership discipline problem, not just isolated incidents. At high proportions, WIP tracking per person is impossible and the team cannot be meaningfully capacity-planned.
Why it matters
When "Team-Level Assignee Coverage — Unassigned WIP Proportion" keeps appearing, the team is signalling a repeatable process gap. Left unexamined, the pattern hides where work really stalls and makes improvement metrics harder to trust.
What you can achieve
Clarify ownership at handoffs and ensure active and done items have an accountable assignee.
Facilitation questions
- What system change would stop "Team-Level Assignee Coverage — Unassigned WIP Proportion" from firing again?
- What do the cited issues have in common — same root cause or same workaround?
- Who owns the two-week experiment and how will we verify on the next import?
Run this rule against your own tracker data with Flow Analyzer.