What an SOP Is and What It Is Not

A standard operating procedure is a written description of how a specific, repeatable task is done in your business, in enough detail that a competent person who has never done it can produce the same result. It is not a policy (why we do things), not a job description (what a role is responsible for), and not a training course. It is the recipe.

Why it matters

Every business runs on processes whether or not they are written down. Unwritten processes live in people’s heads, vary by who does them, and leave with the person who knew them. Written processes can be delegated, improved, audited and scaled. For a small business, documentation is the difference between the owner being the bottleneck and the owner being free to grow the business.

The parts of a usable SOP

1. Title that names the task in plain words: How to onboard a new client.
2. Purpose in one or two sentences: what outcome this produces and why it matters.
3. Owner: who is accountable for the procedure being correct.
4. Trigger: when this procedure starts (an event, a date, a request).
5. Inputs and tools: what you need before starting.
6. Steps: numbered, each starting with a verb, each producing a checkable result.
7. Done criteria: how you know it is finished correctly.
8. Exceptions: what to do when the common things go wrong.
9. Version and date.

Worked example

A bookkeeping practice has a process for onboarding new clients that the founder does from memory. When she hires an assistant, the first three onboardings each miss a different step: one client never gets software access, another is not asked for prior-year files, a third is not added to the deadline calendar. Written as an SOP with the nine parts above, the fourth onboarding is done by the assistant alone with no misses. The founder’s time on onboarding drops to a ten-minute review.

Common mistakes

• Writing a policy or a philosophy and calling it an SOP.
• Steps so vague they require the original person to interpret them: handle the paperwork.
• No done criteria, so nobody knows when it is finished.
• No owner, so nobody updates it when the process changes.

Action Step: Pick one task you did this week that someone else could do if it were written down. Write the title, purpose, trigger and done criteria for it in four lines. You have just started your first SOP.