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Quarterly Bench Health Review

Use this template once per quarter to review whether AI adoption is preserving the first rung, review quality, and future bench strength.

1. Scope

• Team / function:
• Quarter:
• Reviewer / owner:
• AI deployments added or expanded this quarter:

2. Pipeline health

• Junior share of workforce:
• Intern / apprentice / associate intake:
• Junior-to-mid promotion flow:
• Time in level for early-career staff:
• Notable changes since last quarter:

3. Learning-work health

• Which task bundles used to provide junior reps?
• Which of those were automated or heavily AI-assisted this quarter?
• What replacement learning pathways exist?
• Share of core tasks still done first without AI:
• Mentorship hours per junior:

4. Review-capacity health

• AI-assisted output volume trend:
• Time per review trend:
• Override / escalation rate:
• Defect or incident signals tied to AI-assisted work:
• Where review is at risk of becoming ceremonial:

5. Employment-decision safeguards

• AI used in hiring, evaluation, promotion, scheduling, or discipline this quarter:
• Notice quality:
• Reason quality:
• Appeal volume and reversal signals:
• Record access / reconstruction quality:
• Any failures of human override or pause authority:

6. Shared-gains check

• Did AI reduce drudge work for staff?
• Did it only raise output expectations?
• Did manager / reviewer load increase?
• Did compensation, progression, or work quality improve in any visible way?

7. Tripwires

Mark any that were triggered:

• junior intake dropped without a replacement pathway
• promotion flow weakened materially
• review load rose without added review capacity
• override rates collapsed while incident risk rose
• teams cannot show where judgment formation now happens
• appeal exists on paper but is not usable in practice

8. Required interventions before next quarter

• Intervention 1:

• Owner:

• Deadline:

• Intervention 2:

• Owner:

• Deadline:

• Intervention 3:

• Owner:

• Deadline:

9. Bridge language

One plain-language sentence leadership can reuse:

We are using AI to remove drudge work without removing the reps, reviewers, and first-rung pathways that keep the organization capable over time.

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