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Glossary
What is an honest close?
Ending a commitment by comparison rather than checkbox: delivered as committed, delivered with named differences, or not delivered — the difference recorded in words whenever the result was not clean.
The close is what makes every earlier claim auditable: whether estimates run light, whether early commitments miss more often, what "high confidence" meant in practice. A "done" checkbox destroys exactly that data at the moment it is freshest.
Related terms
- Delivery outcome — The explicit close of a commitment: what actually shipped, and — when the result is not a clean delivery — what differed from the promise.
- RAG status — A traffic-light health signal on delivery — on track, at risk, off track — that is a judgement by the person accountable, not a computation, and is only worth reading when the reasoning comes with it.
This definition comes from building DeliverySheet — it takes a vague work request to a clear delivery decision, so the shape, owner, capacity, dependencies and open questions are on the table before anyone commits people or a date.