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Align AGENTS, AutonomyPolicy, SCOPE, OperatingRhythm with fleet residual role (live intakes, not SCOPE prose). Capture BINKY-WP-0006 leftovers as AWQ-011 (brief-weekly) and AWQ-012 (open-weights retarget).
110 lines
4.3 KiB
Markdown
110 lines
4.3 KiB
Markdown
# Autonomy Policy
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> Status: draft v0.1 — 2026-07-16. Governs what agents may do without the
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> founder. In force once ratified. The operating rule: **"ask Bernd" is never
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> the default.**
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## The rule
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> If the founder is unavailable, the system must either continue safely,
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> prepare the next decision, or explicitly defer with evidence. It must not
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> silently idle.
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Valid states: `proceeding` | `prepared for review` | `deferred by policy`.
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Invalid state: `waiting because unsure`. Uncertainty triggers research,
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comparison, preparation, or risk classification — not paralysis.
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## Autonomy lanes
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| Lane | Name | Agent may | Human needed? |
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| --- | --- | --- | --- |
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| **Green** | Safe autonomous | Research, summarize, classify, draft, organize, test, prepare | No |
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| **Blue** | Reversible execution | Internal docs, backlog updates, local scripts, reports, local commits | No, but logged |
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| **Yellow** | Deferred approval | Prepare external emails, invoices, offers, releases, payments | Yes, async via decision queue |
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| **Orange** | Time-window approval | Customer/legal/accounting/banking actions needing business hours | Yes, on office-hour days |
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| **Red** | Human-only | Signing, strategic commitments, bank changes, sensitive legal/HR/security | Always |
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Optimization target: maximize Green+Blue throughput, queue Yellow, batch
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Orange into office-hour days, protect Red from automation.
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## Default policies
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- **Research:** if uncertain, collect evidence and produce a comparison. Ask
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only if ambiguity changes risk or external commitment.
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- **Documentation:** agents may create/improve internal markdown freely; must
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preserve provenance and mark assumptions.
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- **Residuals (finished workplans):** before marking a workplan `finished`,
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hand off actionable leftovers as **live work records** (intake with
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`origin: residual` + `origin_ref: <WP-id>`, or a next workplan / decision /
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engagement). Green/Blue residual capture is normal autonomous work. Do not
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park residuals only in prose or `SCOPE.md`. Fleet canon:
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`work-record-types_v0.1.md` § Residuals.
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- **Email:** draft freely; send only pre-approved low-risk routine categories.
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Pricing, commitments, complaints, contracts, legal → decision queue.
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- **Spending:** recommend freely; never spend outside approved recurring
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budgets or explicit thresholds.
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- **Product:** refine specs, use cases, architecture, backlog freely; strategic
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direction is never final without founder approval.
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- **Code:** branches, tests, prototypes, docs, local commits freely; no
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production deploys without policy-approved checks.
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## Approval packages
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When an agent hits a lane boundary it prepares a complete decision package,
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not a bare question:
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```yaml
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decision: ""
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recommended_action: ""
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reason: ""
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evidence: []
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risk_level: yellow
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reversibility: low | medium | high
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deadline: ""
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attention_cost: "15 min"
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fallback_if_no_approval: ""
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options: [approve, reject, revise, defer]
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```
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## Founder attention budget
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```yaml
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daily_attention_budget:
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available_minutes: 90 # typical of the 1–3 h window
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max_decisions_per_day: 7
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max_deep_topics_per_day: 1
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interaction_style: [concise briefs, approve/reject options, evidence links]
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```
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## Founder availability is first-class state
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```yaml
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founder_availability:
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state: available | evening_window | unavailable | office_hour_day
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allowed_escalation_when_unavailable:
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- critical security incident
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- payment failure
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- legal deadline
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```
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On return from absence, agents produce a **Return Brief**: what changed, what
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progressed, what waits, what went stale, what risks increased, recommended
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decisions for today.
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## Initial autonomy thresholds
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| Area | Autonomous? | Limit |
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| --- | ---: | --- |
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| Internal docs | Yes | Preserve previous versions |
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| Research | Yes | Cite/store sources |
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| Backlog refinement | Yes | Propose, don't delete major items |
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| Code prototypes | Yes | Branch only, no production deploy |
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| Customer emails | Draft only | Send after approval |
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| Social/publishing | Draft only | Publish after approval |
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| Payments | No | Prepare only |
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| Contracts | No | Analyze/draft only |
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| Security changes | Mostly no | Prepare/test only |
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| Cloud infra | Limited | Non-production only |
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Raise autonomy per area only after the system proves reliable there, by
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explicit founder decision recorded in `DecisionQueue.md`.
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