Engineering values and ways of working¶

Owner: Engineering manager
Applies to: All team members and sites
Enforcement: Review, retrospectives, ownership register checks
Related: EG-008, EG-024, EG-026
Principles: EV-01 to EV-08 (see principles.md)

Note

Rules marked (core) apply to every product and cannot be tailored. Other rules, and all numeric values, are proposed defaults that a product may tailor in its conformance profile (EG-001).

Purpose¶

State the values that tie the other guidelines together, and set out how the team makes decisions, resolves disagreements, and works across sites and time zones.

Values¶

ID	Value	Meaning in practice
EV-01	Ownership	Every asset has a named owner accountable for its quality and future
EV-02	Quality built in	Quality is produced by the way we work, not inspected in at the end
EV-03	Written and open by default	Decisions, agreements and handovers are recorded where others can find them
EV-04	Evidence over opinion	Claims about performance, defects and risk are backed by data
EV-05	Blameless learning	We fix systems and processes, not people
EV-06	Small steps	Small, frequent, reversible changes beat large, rare ones
EV-07	Simplicity	The simplest solution that meets the need is preferred
EV-08	Respect for others’ time	Cross-site work is designed for time zones, and requests are clear and complete

Rules¶

VAL-01 The values above SHOULD be used as tie-breakers when guidelines are silent and principles do not settle a question.
VAL-02 Every component, guideline, pipeline, test rig and tool MUST have a named owner in CODEOWNERS or the ownership register. Unowned assets are reported monthly.
VAL-03 Decision rights MUST be recorded in the decision rights table (below). The accountable person decides after consulting those affected.
VAL-04 Disagreements escalate in steps: discuss directly, write it up as an RFC or ADR, sponsor decides, then architecture group or engineering manager. Each step has a time limit of five working days.
VAL-05 After a decision, the team MUST disagree and commit. Reopening a decision needs new evidence, recorded in a new ADR.
VAL-06 Decisions, agreements and handovers MUST be written down in the repository or tracker. Outcomes of meetings MUST be recorded within one working day.
VAL-07 Every component MUST have one owning site and a named deputy at a second site, so that no knowledge or authority is site-exclusive.
VAL-08 Cross-site working agreements MUST define core overlap hours, expected response time (acknowledge within one working day), and a handover note for work that passes between sites.
VAL-09 All sites use the same tools, conventions and pipelines. A site-specific variant needs an ADR.
VAL-10 Work status MUST be visible in the tracker and pipeline, so that status is read, not requested.
VAL-11 Changes SHOULD be small enough to be reviewed within one working day.
VAL-12 Raising a risk, a disagreement or a mistake MUST be treated as expected behaviour and never penalised.

Decision rights¶

Decision	Decides	Must consult
Component design within its boundary	Component owner	Architecture group
Interface between components or sites	Architecture group	Both component owners
Change to a guideline	Guideline owner, through an RFC	Affected teams
Adoption of a tool or dependency	Architecture group, through an RFC	Build and tooling lead, security lead
Release go or no-go	Release manager	Test and quality lead, security lead
Exception to a security rule	Security lead	Architecture group
Priority between work items	Product owner	Engineering manager

Handover note¶

A handover note between sites states what was done, and what is in progress and where. It also says what is blocked and by whom, what needs a decision, and where the current state lives (branch, PR, ticket).

Compliance¶

Rule	Checked by
VAL-02	Ownership register and CODEOWNERS check in CI
VAL-04, VAL-05	RFC and ADR history review
VAL-06, VAL-10	Retrospective review, tracker audit
VAL-07, VAL-08	Ownership register, quarterly cross-site review

Checklist¶

Tick an item when it is true for your project. Rule IDs point to the detail above.

As Markdown. To copy it into an issue, a pull request or a review record:

- [ ] Values are published and used as tie-breakers (VAL-01)
- [ ] Every component, pipeline, rig and tool has a named owner in CODEOWNERS or the ownership register (VAL-02)
- [ ] The decision rights table is current (VAL-03)
- [ ] Escalation steps and time limits are agreed, and decisions are committed to once made (VAL-04, VAL-05)
- [ ] Decisions, agreements and meeting outcomes are written down within one working day (VAL-06)
- [ ] Each component has an owning site and a deputy at another site (VAL-07)
- [ ] Cross-site agreements cover overlap hours, response time and the handover note (VAL-08)
- [ ] All sites use the same tools and conventions, and variants have an ADR (VAL-09)
- [ ] Work status is visible in the tracker and pipeline (VAL-10)
- [ ] Changes are small enough to review within one working day (VAL-11)
- [ ] Raising a risk, disagreement or mistake is treated as expected behaviour (VAL-12)

Applying to personal projects and AI agents¶

Personal projects¶

Starts at the Full profile (see personal-projects.md). Keep written-by-default, small steps, simplicity and evidence over opinion. Decision rights collapse to you. Skip the cross-site rules.

AI agents¶

Prefer small, reviewable changes (VAL-11).
Record decisions and assumptions in the PR or an ADR, not only in chat (VAL-06).
Raise risks and doubts early and do not hide uncertainty (VAL-12).