Oversight in motion
Scheduled confirmation
Scheduled confirmation is the placement of a small number of deliberate checkpoints inside a long task, weighted toward the start, in place of confirming every step or confirming only at the end.
Control sits with both parties
When to use it
Tasks long enough that an early error would be expensive to unwind, which in practice means anything over roughly ten steps.
What it prevents
Redoing the whole task because an error was found only at the end, and interrupting the person so often that delegating saves little time.
Long runcheckpoint 1 of 3
- 1Steps 1 to 3 complete
Ran without asking - 2Checkpoint: 3 of 12
Confirm the mapping before the remaining nine steps build on it - 3Checkpoint at 7
Scheduled - 4Checkpoint at 11
Scheduled
Where it stands
We have not yet found this pattern in a commercial product. It comes from the research.
Sources
Related patterns: Action guard · Altitude control