How to write a procedure with a free template

Why do we need Procedures?

There are a few reasons that having documented or written procedures in your business or organisation makes sense. From the simplest point of view, for a small business, a procedure can allow you to step away from the activity of the business with the trust that your employees will know what to do. At a higher level in a large business with many departments, procedures provide a quality management system that ensures your products or services meet the quality expectations of your customers and clients.

By having standard procedures in place you can ensure that you get the same output each time, people know what to do and how to do it, or who to contact if something goes wrong.

Procedures can be especially helpful for things that don’t happen every day, so you don’t have to rely on memory for a task that happens once a quarter or once a year.

Key Steps for writing a Procedure

I am paraphrasing ISO Global’s information from ISO9001 here. Checkout more details in their article.

1. Align to Business process

Take time to understand the context of the process as part of the bigger picture. In a small business this may be as simple as ensuring that all of your burgers have the right ingredients. For a large business with multiple departments, you may need to speak to several people or teams to fully understand all of the stakeholders and all of the inputs required and users of the outputs.

2. Define the Scope of the Procedure

Figure out the limits of the procedure – where does it start and end and who do the actions in the process relate to?

3. Gather Process Information

Talk to the person, people or teams responsible for the process. Map out the process. At its simplest, a process is a list of steps and actions. It gets more complicated with the number of inputs and outputs related to the process. You may end up with a list or a complicated process map on an A3 sheet of paper with steps across several departments and a complicated timeline.

4. Create a Standard Structure

Having a simple template with headings and capturing the same section in these headings will ensure that your procedures are easy to read and follow when switching between different procedures. The globally recognised standard structure includes:

Scope and Purpose

Definitions

Responsibilities

Procedure

References (checklists, templates, forms etc)

Version history (Author, approvals, date, versions etc).

5. Document the Procedure, Review and Approve

Now you have all the info, its time to write! Again, depending on the size of your business or organisation, its good to have a formal process for reviewing and approving procedures. The person who is accountable for the output of the process. In a large business this could be the head of the team, the business unit, the department or one of the executive leadership. In a small business – its probably you, the person reading this article.

6. Communicate and Provide training

There is no point having a procedure if no one know about it or where to find it. Ensure you provide training to your people and guidance on where and how to find the procedure, and what to do if something goes wrong.

My formula for writing a Great Procedure

So you can see what you need to do but you are still not sure how to pull it together so it makes sense? My favourite place to start is with the 5W’s (technically 6 but who’s counting?).

Who, What, When, Where, Why and How?

Answering these questions in your procedure will ensure that you have it covered and that anyone can come in and carry out the task at hand. Trick is, I mix up the order to suit the flow.

Why? – what is the purpose of the procedure? What does the process being documented achieve?

Who? – who needs to follow the procedure? Is it a particular role, a team of people or everyone in the organisation? This provides your scope.

What? – what is required to complete the task? Are there particular equipment, materials or information or data required?

Where? - where is relevant where there are multiple locations and the task is location specific.

When? – when does the task need to be done, is it daily, weekly, monthly or once a year?

How? - outline the procedure step by step, with as much details required for someone who is not familiar with the procedure to complete it.

Final Tips

Here are some of my key takeaways for making sure your procedure works

Keep it short and succinct

For the scope and purpose sections, 1- 2 short paragraphs are plenty. The processes can be captured in dot points.

Test it

Have someone do the task using only the procedure, this will identify steps that are missing or don’t make sense.

Keep it up to date

Procedures should be living documents, as the business grows and develops, the procedures should also grow and develop so that they continue to represent what is actually happening.

Having a new person in the business is a great time to review or rewrite your procedures.

Use simple language

Use the KISS principal, updated and kinder, Keep It Super Simple

Use pictures and diagrams

A picture tells a thousand words, where its appropriate, take a screen grab and point out what to do.

Template

Now that you have the knowledge and a process to write a procedure, download my template and get started!