Watchdog

Continuity checks are timed or evidence-triggered interventions that keep an agent workflow from going idle, drifting, or entering needless bureaucracy. They operationalize the refocus doctrine.

Use this when

• Authoring a watchdog policy for a long-running rig (artifact-pool edges, stale-owner detection, periodic reminders).
• Choosing the intervention level for a stale-owner situation: is this a wake, a refocus, or an alignment checkpoint?
• Drafting wake/refocus/alignment-checkpoint message text that prevents cadence pollution and bureaucracy theater.
• Deciding cadence — scan vs wake intervals, conservative vs aggressive nudging.

Don't use this when