Engineering intent includes approved requirements, decisions, and work a team agreed to do. Engineering reality includes changes, checks, and operating events that occurred. A delivery team needs to connect the two so it can find gaps before a status report or completed ticket is mistaken for proof that the intended outcome exists.
Make the work traceable
For a useful slice of work, record the request and acceptance criteria, decisions that shape implementation, the issue or story that owns delivery, and the commit or pull request that changes the code. Link relevant checks and reviews. The goal is not a separate paperwork process; it is to keep references to normal engineering work together so a reviewer can follow the chain.
Separate status from evidence
- Claimed. A person or agent reports that work happened or reached a state.
- Observed. A trusted connector reads an external artifact, such as a commit or check event.
- Verified. An independent system confirms a defined outcome against an expectation.
These signals answer different questions. A claim can report progress; an observed commit can establish that a repository artifact exists; a passing check can confirm the cases it runs. None should silently stand in for another. A gap between status and required evidence is information for review, not an automatic instruction to change code or an external system.
For example, a completed issue may carry an agent claim and a commit reference but no check result required by its lane. The record should show who made the claim, which connector observed the commit, and that the expected check is still missing. A reviewer can then request the check, accept a documented exception, or reopen the work. The missing link should create an accountable follow-up, not an automatic code change.
Route gaps to human review
Define evidence expected for a class of work, then make missing links visible when a task is marked complete. Give a person or agent an issue to investigate the gap, attach the missing reference, or explain an approved exception. Keep detection separate from remediation so a system can identify drift without changing repositories or decisions on its own.
Start with one delivery path
Choose a workflow where teams often lose track of approvals, changes, or checks. Map where each fact originates, who can record it, and how long its reference remains useful. Add only the evidence links needed to resolve a real review question. Then assess whether the chain is easier to inspect and where the next gap remains.