Practical workflows
Bounded Critic Loop Workflow
Use an independent critique and revision loop with a frozen rubric, evidence requirements, iteration budget, and human-owned acceptance decision.
- Format
- Playbook
- Level
- Intermediate
- Audience
- Practitioner, Developer
- Owner
- Project42 Editorial
- Review cadence
- Every 90 days
- Prerequisites
- A draft artifact and observable acceptance criteria; A versioned rubric with blocking conditions; A human owner for the final decision
Freeze the contract before critique
Define purpose, audience, required and forbidden behavior, evidence, rubric anchors, blocking failures, and maximum rounds before asking for a critique. Changing the rubric after seeing a weak result turns evaluation into preference chasing.
Use a separate context, model, reviewer, or deterministic check where independence matters, but do not treat different model branding as proof of independent judgment. Give the critic the artifact and rubric, not hidden reasoning.
Critique claims, revise deliberately, and stop
Require each finding to name the violated criterion, observable evidence, severity, and smallest useful correction. The author accepts, rejects with evidence, or escalates each finding; silently applying every suggestion can create regressions.
Rerun deterministic checks and the complete rubric after each revision. Stop at the declared round or budget limit, when no blocking finding remains, or when disagreement requires a qualified human.
Task: [ARTIFACT AND ACCEPTANCE DECISION]
Scope: [ARTIFACT, AUDIENCE, ALLOWED CHANGES, AND EXCLUSIONS]
Permissions: [WHO MAY READ, CRITIQUE, EDIT, RUN TOOLS, AND ACCEPT]
Rubric: [CRITERIA, ANCHORS, WEIGHTS, AND BLOCKING FAILURES]
Evidence: [SOURCES, TESTS, OUTPUT CONTRACT, AND USER POSTCONDITION]
Loop budget: [MAX ROUNDS, TIME, COST, AND CONTEXT]
Finding format: [CRITERION -> EVIDENCE -> SEVERITY -> PROPOSED CORRECTION]
Stop conditions: [BLOCKING RISK, LOW CONFIDENCE, CONFLICT, OR BUDGET]
Verification: [FROZEN RUBRIC, DETERMINISTIC CHECKS, REGRESSION REVIEW, HUMAN DECISION]
Recovery: [RESTORE PRIOR VERSION, PRESERVE FINDINGS, AND ESCALATE UNRESOLVED ITEMS]Expected result and verification
Expected evidence includes the frozen contract, original artifact, reviewer configuration, criterion-linked findings, author dispositions, versioned revisions, deterministic results, round and cost record, final rubric, unresolved risks, and human decision.
Stop when the critic invents requirements, requests protected data, cannot cite observable evidence, cycles between alternatives, or exceeds budget. Restore the last passing artifact, retain the decision log, and send unresolved high-impact disagreement to a qualified human reviewer.