Tag Archives: Policies & procedures

Procedures: how to write for business benefit

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Most businesses define work activities in a written procedure. (If your business doesn’t, it really should.) Procedures, sometimes called Standard Operating Procedures (SOP), work instructions or safe work method statements, are the basis for a well controlled business.

But how do you write a procedure well? What makes a good SOP? You could mindlessly follow a template someone else has developed, or you could think about what you want to achieve, what would work best for your business. Some templates can be helpful, but they may not be best for your organisation. See some examples.

The elements of good work procedures

A purpose statement and a link to overall process

Workers need to know how the activity they perform fits into the big picture; how it contributes to the overall process and the purpose of the organisation.You could do this with a context statement, or locating the activity in a process map. Also give a thoughtful title to the procedure.

When working in the road surfacing industry, we changed a procedure title from ‘Drive the broom tractor’ to ‘Prepare the surface’. This had an immediate impact on how workers viewed the activity and lifted the self esteem of the broom driver.

Performance standards

Procedures should do more than merely provide a list of tasks to perform. They should include information about how to assess the quality of those tasks. Workers and supervisors then have some objective measures to judge performance.

The standards could be related to quality, performance or safety.

Grouped into sensible work chunks

Chunking work into steps and sub-steps provides helpful structure for workers. It avoids a long list of tasks, and fits well with the way workers think about the job.

For example, the work chunk ‘Find outstanding invoices’ could have sub-steps like Find the file, Search invoices by date range, Print report.

‘Thinking’ and ‘Doing’ sections

“Work is the exercise of discretion within boundaries.”
John Ralph, former CEO of CRA.

Procedures, SOPs, define the boundaries. They are the things workers must do. But to better engage workers, we want them thinking about their work too. That’s good for them and good for the business. So we might want to direct thinking about productivity, safety or environmental matters.

For example, include thinking prompts in the procedure like: ‘How could we reduce the paperwork?’ ‘Residents may be moving in and out of driveways as you inspect the footpath – take care.’

Standard resources

Include the equipment needed for the task, including safety related equipment. Describe the skills and competencies required. It may be appropriate to include the standard time taken for the task.

All this information allows you to cost the procedure and measure the impact of improvements and changes to business practice. For example, we discovered it takes 10 minutes to process and record payments into a law firm’s trust fund. If the firm offers clients a payment plan, increasing the number of payments, they may significantly increase their back office costs.

Plain language

All documents should be written in plain language.

When procedures are written plainly, workers can understand them quickly and implement them. If they are written in a style that workers find difficult, they may be confused and do the wrong thing, or waste time asking for clarification, or totally ignore the procedures and do what they think is best.

Effective, less risky procedure documents

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Far too often policy manuals, standard operating procedures, work method statements sit on the shelf and are hardly ever used. They are read by quality system auditors every few years, but they are hardly ever used by people in the business.

This is a problem for two reasons:

  1. Developing these documents is costly in both direct writing costs and the time lost by people diverted from their normal work to provide the content. Manuals are an expensive asset – it is important to get a return on investment.
  2. There is often a mismatch between what is written and what is done. Over time small changes are made to processes that are not reflected in the manual. Whether by laziness or an over cumbersome approval system, the end result is a mismatch between what managers think and what workers do – a very risky situation for any organisation.

There is no magic bullet to solve the problem. However, one thing that can help is to change the way documents are written and formatted.

Make sure policy and procedure documents are useful.

Manuals must provide relevant information to those who will use them. They must contain information that is important for doing the job without lots of extra fluff.

Make sure policy and procedure documents are usable.

People must be able to find the information they need quickly. And once they find it, they must be able to extract meaning quickly. So, a few things that can help;

  • avoid pages of document control information at the start – the user is not interested
  • keep line lengths short to make them more readable
  • use consistent styles so that users easily recognize information types
  • use photos instead of always relying on text descriptions
  • try starting all action steps with a verb

Make policy and procedure documents attractive

Entice people to use manuals by making them pleasing to the eye. There is no reason why work documents should be ugly. Form and function should come together.

Action

Find out which documents are being used and which just sit on the shelf.

Find out who is using them and how they are being used.

Check the written practice against the actual practice.

Think before you consult when writing policies

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Top view of co-workers planning a strategy Free Photo
Business photograph designed by Pressfoto – Freepik.com

Employee consultation has become a ‘sacred cow’ when writing policies and procedures. There’s a tendency for organisations to involve all possible stakeholders so that everyone can have their say when defining how things work in an organisation. It’s promoted as a way to create an engaged and empowered workforce; an antidote to a command and control culture.

But consultation takes time and can be counter productive. Countless hours can be lost in document reviews and meetings, sometimes with little benefit.

Yet consultation communicates that you and your organisation value people and respect their point of view, knowledge and experience.

So, think before you run every policy through the same consultation process. Discern which documents will benefit from consultation, and who should be involved.

Consider policies in three broad groups:

1. Policies where consultation is pointless

If you are developing policies or procedure to implement a non-negotiable directive from the board, or a piece of legislation, consultation may not be helpful. Just write the document and get on with it. Consultation in this situation may even be harmful – it can raise the expectation of negotiation and input when there is none. You could lose credibility.

2. Policies where input from others is essential

Sometimes subject matter expertise resides in a number of people. You’ll need to consult to find out what is happening, or the best way of doing something. Find the right people and involve them in every stage of drafting and review. You’ll end up with a richer outcome by listening to appropriate stakeholders.

3. Policies where people just want to have their say

There are some policies in an organisation that stir the passions – like the ‘car policy’. People want to be heard but full consultation is not mission critical. When developing policies like this, I often invite comment but don’t run a full consultation process. Of course, if you invite comment you need to consider it – revise the policy or provide other feedback.

(this blog inspired by a conversation with Adam Leonard, General Manager Human Resources, Anglicare)