Does sign-off on every cycle slow the routine down?

The cycle runs unattended up to the gate, and the person reviews a finished cycle rather than each step of it. The gate sits on the step that takes effect, which is where the approval gates entry places it.

Who decides a routine has drifted?

The drift check surfaces a difference between the run and the definition. A named owner decides whether the definition is wrong or the run is, and records which.

Plans vs routines: projects & recurring processes

One approval habit applied to a project and a recurring process fits neither of them

Today

One habit for finite and recurring work

You govern a migration and a monthly billing run with the same status meeting and the same approval habit.
One of them will be done and the other never will, and the habit fits neither.
A recurring process treated like a project is approved once and then drifts.
A project treated like a process never closes, because nothing says when it is finished.

With agents

Two shapes, each approved on its own terms

Recurring work stops drifting silently.
Projects close.
Oversight matches the shape of the work.

The two shapes of governed work

Governed work takes one of two shapes, and the shape decides how it is approved, reviewed and finished.

01

A plan is finite

It has an end state, sequenced tracks with dependencies between them, and acceptance criteria. It is done when the criteria are met, and done means closed.

02

A routine is recurring

It is defined once, runs on a cadence, and is never done. Its governance is a review of the cadence itself and a check for drift, because a routine left alone long enough is running against a definition somebody forgot.

03

The unit of approval is the difference

A plan is approved per phase, against the criteria for that phase. A routine is approved per cycle, against its definition. Approving a routine once, at setup, is approving a plan that has no end.

04

Human gate

Cycle sign-off is the gate on every run of a routine: the cycle's output routes to a named person before it takes effect. A plan's phase gate does the same at each phase boundary. The approval gates entry defines the gate; How It Works describes how it is enforced.

05

Success differs

A plan succeeds by completing. A routine succeeds by staying stable, which is why drift checks are its review surface.

06

Most of what an agent runs is a routine

A build, a migration or a cleanup is a plan. Monthly client billing with sign-off on every run, and recurring reports that spawn themselves, are routines, and their entries show the shape at work.

07

The shapes hand off to each other

A drift check can find a change that needs a project, and the routine spawns a plan. A plan can leave a routine behind, when the thing it built now runs on a cadence. New work arrives from outside through proactive drafting, or is found inside the record through observation; each has its own entry.

Results

What changes when the shape decides the governance

Routines stop drifting

Each cycle is signed off against the definition, so a change shows up as a difference rather than as a surprise.

Projects reach done

The acceptance criteria are the end state, and meeting them ends the plan, so a project cannot drift into a permanent status line.

Oversight fits the shape

Phase gates for plans, cycle sign-off for routines, instead of one habit applied to both and fitting neither.

Where this fits

Concept

Plan and routine are the two shapes that governed work takes in this library, and most of the workflow entries are routines with sign-off on every cycle. The Platform page is the way up from here. How It Works describes how a work order moves through its states; this entry describes which of the two shapes a piece of work is and why the shape changes how it is governed.

AAOS Platform

How It Works

Questions, answered

A piece of work is one or the other at a time. It changes shape through the handoffs above, on a recorded decision.

Plans vs routines: projects & recurring processes, governed differently