no-deferred-work

Create a tracked issue with a full description, acceptance criteria, and a link to where the work was discovered, then reference that issue number in the code. This replaces informal TODO comments with accountable, trackable work items.

Either implement the work immediately if it is in scope, or create a separate issue and reference it in a comment if explicitly approved as out of scope. A reference to a tracked issue is not a TODO.

Add a pre-commit hook that greps the staged diff for TODO, FIXME, HACK, or XXX markers and exits with an error if found. This forces the author to complete the work or file an issue before committing.

Deferral is acceptable only after getting explicit permission from your human partner, creating a properly tracked issue with acceptance criteria, and referencing that issue in the code. Time pressure or low perceived importance are not valid reasons.

Placeholder implementations like returning empty objects or swallowing errors hide incomplete work that often ships to production. They create silent failures and technical debt that is rarely revisited once committed.