ADLC Constitution
Version: 1.3.0 | Ratified: 2025-11-11 | Last Amended: 2025-12-04
The Agent Development Lifecycle (ADLC) Constitution defines the non-negotiable principles and governance framework for enterprise AI agent development. It ensures that AI agents operate within safe, auditable, and compliant boundaries throughout their lifecycle.
7 Constitutional Principles
| # | Principle | Focus |
|---|---|---|
| I | Acceptable Agency | Human oversight, scope boundaries, traceability |
| II | Interoperability & Security | MCP standard, authentication, access control |
| III | Evaluation-First | KPIs, comprehensive testing, behavior quality |
| IV | Hybrid Deployment | Multi-environment, progressive rollout, sandboxing |
| V | Observability & Resilience | MELT telemetry, SLOs, drift detection |
| VI | Governance & Compliance | Catalogs, certification, regulatory compliance |
| VII | Agent Engineering Excellence | Orchestrator pattern, meta-agent governance |
Enterprise Coordination
The ADLC framework enforces a mandatory coordination protocol ensuring business validation, technical design, and specialist execution follow a structured sequence with evidence collection at each step.
ADLC Workflow Phases
The six-phase lifecycle provides structured progression from planning through operations, with human approval gates at critical transitions.
| Phase | Purpose |
|---|---|
| Plan | Requirements analysis, architecture decisions |
| Build | Implementation with automated validation |
| Test/Release | Comprehensive quality assurance |
| Deploy | Progressive rollout with safety controls |
| Monitor | Continuous observability and drift detection |
| Operate | Runbooks, incident response, optimization |
Governance Coverage
The constitution provides 58 checkpoints across all principles, ensuring comprehensive validation from pre-execution through operational excellence. See Checkpoints Reference for the summary.
Amendment Procedure
- Constitution supersedes all other development practices
- Amendments require documented rationale, stakeholder approval, migration plan
- Version increments follow semantic versioning (MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH)
Detailed coordination protocols, quality gate thresholds, evidence requirements, and enforcement mechanisms are available to enterprise consumers. Contact us for access.
Reference
- Source:
.specify/memory/constitution.md - Checkpoints Reference
- Constitutional Principles