"Procedures are a poor substitute for expertise.
Standards exist for the moments when you are tired, rushed, or politically pressured. In a debate about what “done” means in practice, they keep improvisation from becoming policy. When they are vague, enforcement becomes personal.
In a debate about what “done” means in practice, people comply with what is enforced, not what is written. If exceptions are informal, you end up with a standard no one can defend and a process no one trusts. Name what you are refusing to optimize, so future changes do not quietly destroy the property you thought you were protecting.
Diane Vaughan is useful here because it forces precision. Re-state the standard as a yes/no check and make the exception path explicit and narrow. Let the boundary do the work.