Never Block on the Human

SkillDev tools

Apply when tempted to ask 'should I do X?' on reversible work. Proceed, present the result, let the human course-correct after the fact; reserve confirmation for irreversible actions.

Available today. Use it from your connected AI after setup.

Connect ahel once, and every AI you use reads what you have installed.

Then ask your AI: use the Never Block on the Human skill

What this skill tells your AI

The instructions your AI receives, as published by sma1lboy/rove in .agents/skills/pstack/skills/principle-never-block-on-the-human/SKILL.md and read by ahel’s review.

The human supervises asynchronously. Agents must stay unblocked: make reasonable decisions, proceed, and let the human course-correct after the fact. Code is cheap. Waiting is expensive.

Why: Every permission pause stalls the pipeline and makes the human the bottleneck. Since code changes are reversible and reviewable, a wrong decision usually costs less than blocking.

Pattern:

  • Proceed, then present. Do the work, show the result. Don't ask "should I do X?" Do X, explain why.
  • Reserve questions for genuine ambiguity. Ask only when you truly cannot infer intent from context.
  • Make the system self-healing. When you notice a problem, log it and fix it in the next round.
  • Supervision is async. The human reviews plans, diffs, and changes on their own schedule. Design workflows for review-after-the-fact.
  • Code is cheap, attention is scarce. A wrong implementation costs minutes to fix. A blocked agent costs the human's attention to unblock.

Boundaries:

  • Irreversible actions (force-push, delete production data, send external messages) still require confirmation.
  • Reversible actions (write code, edit notes, split tasks) should proceed without blocking.
  • Product direction comes from the human; execution should not block.

Signals

GitHub stars
122
Forks
8
Last commit
Sep 2026
Advanced
Catalog kind
skill
Gateway key
principle-never-block-on-the-human-sma1lboy
Source
github.com/sma1lboy/rove