Process Approval Model¶

Executive Summary¶

The Process Approval Model defines how Business Processes identify, prepare, route, record, and enforce human approval gates for high-impact process steps.

Why This Exists¶

Procurement processes can create financial, compliance, contractual, customer, supplier, and reputational consequences. AIOS and Digital Professionals may prepare work, but high-impact process steps require authorized human approval.

Owner¶

The owner is the Chief Product Officer and Enterprise Architect. The owning Practice defines approval gates. Executive Office coordinates material approvals. Humans retain accountability for approved decisions.

Business Value¶

Approval discipline protects customers, enables auditability, improves trust, and allows automation to operate safely within clear boundaries.

Approval Flow¶

stateDiagram-v2
    [*] --> StepReady
    StepReady --> ApprovalRequired
    ApprovalRequired --> PackagePrepared
    PackagePrepared --> Routed
    Routed --> Approved
    Routed --> Rejected
    Routed --> RevisionRequested
    RevisionRequested --> StepReady
    Approved --> ContinueProcess
    Rejected --> StopOrRevise
    ContinueProcess --> [*]
    StopOrRevise --> [*]

Approval Gate Types¶

Gate	Trigger
Strategic gate	Process changes priority, bid/no-bid position, pursuit strategy, or executive direction.
Compliance gate	Process changes compliance status, readiness claim, document interpretation, or eligibility position.
Financial gate	Process affects pricing, funding, payment, subscription, cash-flow, or budget exposure.
Contractual gate	Process affects contract obligation, variation, dispute, delivery commitment, or closeout acceptance.
External communication gate	Process sends material communication to buyers, suppliers, funders, partners, or customers.
Memory gate	Process creates durable memory that affects future reasoning.
Exception gate	Process deviates from approved SOP or automation guardrail.

Approval Package Standard¶

Component	Requirement
Decision question	Clear statement of what the human is approving.
Process context	Process name, instance, owner, state, and trigger.
Recommendation	Proposed action and rationale.
Evidence	Source facts, documents, events, memory, and assumptions.
Impact	Business, compliance, financial, contractual, customer, and timing impact.
Confidence	AIOS or Professional confidence score and uncertainty.
Alternatives	Options considered and trade-offs.
Expiry	Time by which the approval is needed.
Audit record	Approval, rejection, revision, or escalation outcome.

Approval Rules¶

Approval cannot be implied by silence for high-impact steps.
Approval must identify the authorized approver.
Approval scope must be specific.
Rejected approvals must stop or revise the relevant process path.
Revision requests must return to the correct process step.
Approval packages must be preserved for audit.