The David Rock
Framework
SCARF & Your Brain at Work
David Rock represents one of the most distinctive thinking patterns in their field. David Rock's approach, captured in this framework as mental models, decision heuristics, and the signature questions they would ask.
The scarf & your brain at work framework distils David Rock's documented approach into a .md skill file you can load into Claude, ChatGPT, or any LLM in seconds.
Where most AI personas generate generic output, this framework is grounded in real documented work: interviews, writing, published frameworks, and the specific decisions David Rock made when it mattered. Use it for decision-making, writing, strategy, or any situation where you want your AI to think with David Rock's distinctive patterns rather than a default model voice.
A glimpse of David Rock's thinking.
The brain is a prediction machine running a continuous threat-and-reward scan, and most workplace friction is not a character problem but a neurological one. The five SCARF domains (Status, Certainty, Autonomy, Relatedness, Fairness) are the specific social currencies the brain treats as survival resources, meaning a slight to any one of them activates the same neural circuitry as a physical threat. Designing better organizations means reducing unnecessary threat activation and increasing reward states systematically, not through motivation posters but through deliberate structural and conversational choices.
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Five specific models, each named and explained with concrete examples, unlocked with purchase.
"Which of the five SCARF domains is most likely being threatened in this situation, and what is the cheapest structural change that would convert it from a threat signal to a neutral or reward signal?"
4 more questions in David Rock's voice are unlocked with purchase.
Full list of anti-patterns unlocked with purchase.
The full framework adds: detailed explanations of all five mental models with real-world examples, the decision heuristics David Rock actually used, remaining signature questions, the complete list of anti-patterns, a copy-paste activation prompt, and a worked example.
Unlocked the moment you purchase. ~2,000 words total. Delivered as a Claude Skill and plain .md within 60 seconds of checkout.
- ✦Core philosophy: 2–3 sentences grounded in David Rock's documented worldview
- ✦Five signature mental models: each named, with concrete examples from their work
- ✦Decision heuristics: the concrete rules they actually used
- ✦Signature questions: five questions that sound like David Rock, not a generic MBA
- ✦What they would NOT do: the anti-patterns this framework rejects
- ✦Copy-paste activation prompt: drop straight into Claude or ChatGPT
- ✦Worked example: the framework applied to a realistic scenario
- →david-rock.zip: a native Claude Skill. Upload to Settings → Skills in Claude, or unzip to
~/.claude/skills/ - →david-rock-framework.md: plain markdown. Works in ChatGPT Custom GPTs, Gemini, Claude Projects, agent system prompts, anywhere
What it does with a real question.
A founder is deciding whether to take a large but difficult client.
My read: take the client only if you can shrink the threat footprint before you sign. A large, difficult client rarely fails on workload alone. It fails because it hits several of your team's social needs at once. Unpredictable demands erode Certainty, a hostile counterpart bruises Status, and when the founder quietly reshuffles everyone's priorities to appease the account, people see Fairness violated. Those threat states drain the prefrontal capacity your team needs for the complex work this client will demand. You end up paying twice: once in difficulty, once in degraded thinking.
So the question is less "can we handle them?" and more "can we shape the engagement so threat stays low?" Revenue size is seductive here, and it tends to make founders skip that design step.
Notice also your own brain. A big contract promises a status and certainty reward, and that pull can make the risks feel smaller than they are. Treat your enthusiasm as data, not evidence.
Next move this week: Before any yes, write down the three most likely friction points with this client, such as scope creep, late payment, or abusive communication. Then decide in advance what contractual or structural guardrail answers each one: a change-order clause, a single point of contact who absorbs the heat, a defined escalation path. Present those terms to the client. Their reaction will tell you most of what you need to know.
The full framework carries five models, decision heuristics, signature questions and a worked example.
Written by claude-sonnet-5-5 with this framework loaded, 2026-10-11. Checked automatically for length and for copied framework text.
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Works as a Claude Skill (.zip) and as a plain .md for ChatGPT, Gemini & every LLM
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Inspired by the documented thinking of David Rock. A mental-model toolkit, not a literal representation. Delivered as a .md file compatible with Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, and any LLM.