diff --git a/.gitignore b/.gitignore
index 2af45b5..f808539 100644
--- a/.gitignore
+++ b/.gitignore
@@ -19,3 +19,6 @@
 # Workspace auth tokens
 .auth-token
 .auth_token
+
+# Platform .external-cache/ (cross-repo subtree fetch cache, see internal#77)
+.external-cache/
diff --git a/dev-lead b/dev-lead
deleted file mode 120000
index 7ad0e64..0000000
--- a/dev-lead
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1 +0,0 @@
-../molecule-dev-department/dev-lead
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/org.yaml b/org.yaml
index 54bb883..f988c4b 100644
--- a/org.yaml
+++ b/org.yaml
@@ -147,10 +147,15 @@ defaults:
 workspaces:
   - !include teams/pm.yaml
   - !include teams/marketing.yaml
-  # Dev tree extracted to molecule-ai/molecule-dev-department (internal#77).
-  # The `dev-lead` symlink at this template's root resolves through the
-  # operator-side sibling-clone convention to molecule-dev-department/dev-lead/.
-  # See README §Dev tree composition for the deploy invariant.
-  - !include dev-lead/workspace.yaml
+  # Dev tree composed via gitops `!external` resolver (internal#77 / molecule-core#105).
+  # Platform fetches molecule-ai/molecule-dev-department at import time into a
+  # content-addressable cache under <orgBaseDir>/.external-cache/. No operator-
+  # side filesystem symlink, no sibling-clone deploy contract — the import is
+  # self-contained. To pin a specific tag/SHA in production, change `ref: main`
+  # below (e.g. `ref: v1.0.0`).
+  - !external
+    repo: molecule-ai/molecule-dev-department
+    ref: main
+    path: dev-lead/workspace.yaml
 
 template_schema_version: 1