05 — Work, Continuity and Handoff

Canonical reference: 00-SPINEWORKSPACE-INTEGRATEWISE-CANON.md §6
Status: Canonical

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1. Work is the shared unit of coordination

Human and AI collaboration must not rely on endless conversational handoffs. The central coordination object is Work.

Every meaningful work item should carry a durable identity and enough state to allow a different human, Twin, agent or provider to continue without re-explaining the entire situation.

Work exists to advance Business Context. Every work item is grounded in a business objective, a KPI, a goal, a commitment, or a lifecycle state. Without that Business Context, Work is just a task description. With it, Work carries the full operating reality needed to understand what matters, why it matters, and what happens next.

2. Work object contract

A Work object should conceptually bind:

work_id
objective
business context references
owner / responsible human
current executor
state and lifecycle
subtasks and dependencies
evidence
commitments
proposals
policy / authority envelope
available capabilities
expected outcome
actual outcome
handoff history
trace and continuity identifiers

3. Operating rule

No participating worker begins meaningful work without a Spine-derived authorized context and Work identity.

This applies whether the worker is a human, Twin, Spine Agent, ADK runtime, workflow or execution provider.

4. Agent handoff model

Spine Agents cooperate through shared Work state and evidence:

Agent A
→ performs sub-work
→ writes evidence / updates Work state
→ handoff recorded
→ Agent B reads same authorized Work context
→ continues

This is the AI equivalent of eliminating human context reconstruction.

5. Handoff contract

Every handoff should preserve: Work ID, objective, context reference, authority envelope, evidence, expected outcome, dependencies, escalation conditions and continuity identifiers.