Sense and decide
Challenge Twice, Then Act
A pre-agreed path for a junior person to raise a concern twice and then act on it, so a brush-off cannot kill a warning.
Borrowed from the two-challenge rule from aviation crew training, as adopted in health care by the TeamSTEPPS program. Read the original source.
Ongoing habit · Minutes to start · Anyone on the team can start it
Try this first
Agree one rule out loud: raise a concern, get no real answer, raise it again. Still nothing, you are expected to stop the work.
Use it when
A junior can't get a safety or quality concern about an AI-influenced decision heard.
Skip it when
The authority has to be real. A path that would get a junior person punished for using it is worse than no path.
How to introduce it
Agree in advance on what happens when someone raises a concern and gets no real answer. They raise it again, harder. If it still goes unaddressed, they have defined authority to act, up to stopping the work. Everyone learns the path before anyone needs it.
How to show up
Build the path while things are calm. Then back the people who use it, above all the first person who challenges a senior colleague and turns out to be right. That moment decides whether anyone uses it again.
How long it takes
A few minutes to establish the rule. It lives as a standing norm.
What makes it hard
Culture decides this, not the rule. Juniors will not use it until challenging a senior has visibly been safe. Watch for the senior who treats a second challenge as insubordination, because that reaction kills the practice.
What it looks like when it's working
A junior re-raises a concern that got brushed off, it gets heard, and the work stops when it should. Concerns that die after one brush-off mean the path exists only on paper.
How long until it sticks
It becomes real the first time someone escalates and is backed rather than punished. One bad reaction resets it.
How you know it stuck
People escalate as a matter of course and seniors treat a second challenge as good work.
The idea behind it
A safety or quality concern should not die because someone brushed it off once. The most junior person in the room may be the one who is right.
Where it comes from
Aviation crew resource management. A codified path for a junior to escalate a concern about an AI-influenced decision, with an explicit backstop so a brush-off can't end it. If a crew member voices a safety concern and doesn't get an adequate response, they are empowered to challenge again: and if still unanswered, to act, up to assuming the other pilot is incapacitated.
Why it matters for senior teams
Seniority can make this problem worse because people are less likely to challenge a high-status colleague
Also fits: Risky or hard-to-undo steps go ahead without a stop