SOP — Work the deconflict queue

Who: Creative Strategist, escalating to Founder on high severity When: whenever the Brand Intelligence tab shows a count · Time: a few minutes each

Why the queue is short

Most differences between two sources aren't conflicts and never reach you. Duplicates, more precise restatements, and figures that simply grew are merged automatically and logged.

That's deliberate. A queue that flagged everything would be ignored within a fortnight, and then it would be worse than having none. If the queue starts feeling noisy, that's a bug — say so, because the classification rules need tuning, not your patience.

The three things that do reach you

Scope change — always highest priority

The claim looks the same and its boundaries moved. *"Lifetime warranty on carpentry hardware"* → *"lifetime warranty on carpentry"*. *"From $19,000"* → *"for $19,000"*.

This is the dangerous one precisely because it reads like a rewording. It isn't — it's a new promise, and it's the kind that ends up in front of a regulator or a disappointed client.

Default to the narrower version until the client confirms otherwise. Never let the broader claim win just because it's more recent.

Contradiction

Two statements that can't both be true now. Usually a number stated two ways.

Go to the source, not the average. If tenure is stated as both 15 years and a decade, get the founding year from the client and derive it. Don't split the difference.

Backward drift

A figure went down. Either the earlier number was wrong, or the two count different things — "homes renovated" and "homeowners served" aren't the same measure. Establish which before touching either record.

Steps

1. Open the highest severity first. The queue is sorted by consequence, not by age.
2. Read both claims side by side, then *why it matters* — it states the actual downstream risk.
3. Pick an option, or write your own. The listed options are suggestions, not a menu.
4. If it needs the client, mark it pending and ask them. Do not guess to clear the queue — an unresolved flag is honest, a guessed resolution is a false record.
5. Escalate high-severity commercial claims to the founder. Warranty scope and pricing structure are business decisions, not copy edits.

The rule

An unresolved conflict blocks nothing but must never be resolved by guessing. The queue existing is not the problem. A wrong entry in the knowledge base is, because every downstream asset inherits it.