How Do I Document Processes In My Business (Without It Becoming a Project That Never Gets Done)
The question comes up constantly: how do I document processes in my business?
And the answer most people get is some version of: write a standard operating procedure, put it in a shared folder, train your team on it. Which sounds reasonable, and produces virtually no results, because it’s the wrong sequence and the wrong format for how real businesses actually operate.
Here’s the version that works.
Why Process Documentation Fails
Before we get into the how, it’s worth being honest about why the usual approach doesn’t work.
Most process documentation fails because the person doing the documenting is also the person who does the task best, which means they skip steps. They assume shared context that doesn’t exist. They write for someone who already knows how to do it, instead of someone who has never done it.
The result is a document that makes sense to the author and nobody else. It gets filed away, never referenced, and the task keeps landing back on the founder’s plate.
Michael Gerber described the model that works in The E-Myth: McDonald’s built a business where any employee could produce a consistent result because the system was built to run without depending on individual expertise. Every step was documented, at the right level of detail, for the person actually executing it.
You don’t need McDonald’s scale to apply that logic. You need the right approach to documentation for your size and context.
Start With the Right Tasks
Not everything needs a documented process. Start with tasks that meet at least two of these three criteria:
Recurring. The task happens weekly, monthly, or on a predictable trigger. One-off tasks don’t justify documentation investment.
Currently owned by you. If you’re doing it and you shouldn’t be, or you’re the only one who knows how, documentation is how you transfer it.
Consistent output required. The task needs to produce approximately the same result every time. Client onboarding, invoicing, weekly reports, social media publishing, lead follow-up , these qualify.
Pick one task. Not five. One. The goal is to build the habit of documentation, not to create a complete operations manual in a weekend.
The Camcorder Method: The Fastest Way to Document Anything
Dan Martell’s Camcorder Method from Buy Back Your Time is the most practical documentation approach for busy entrepreneurs.
Here’s the entire method: the next time you do the task, record yourself doing it. Turn on Loom, your phone camera, or your screen recorder. Then do the task at normal speed while narrating what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, and what decisions you’re making along the way.
That’s it.
The recording captures something that written instructions almost never capture: your thinking. Not just the steps, but the judgment calls. “When I see this, I do that.” “If the client says X, I respond with Y.” “This step takes longer if Z is true.”
That judgment is what makes the process actually work. Written SOPs describe the steps. Video captures the expertise.
From the recording, someone on your team (or you, at a later time) can create a written checklist as a quick reference. But the video is the training asset. It takes 20 minutes to create and saves hours of repeated questions.
What a Useful Process Document Actually Contains
If you’re writing a process document rather than (or in addition to) recording it, here’s what actually needs to be in it:
The trigger. What starts this process? A client signing a contract, a payment received, a specific day of the week, an email that comes in? Be explicit. “When X happens, begin this process.”
The output. What does a completed version of this look like? A sent email, an updated spreadsheet, a published post, a delivered package? Define done.
The steps, numbered. Not prose. A numbered list. Steps should be small enough that anyone can confirm they’ve completed them. “Write the client summary” is too big. “Open the client summary template, fill in sections 1-3 from the intake form, review for accuracy, send to client” is actionable.
Decision points. Where does the process branch? If the client doesn’t respond within 48 hours, what happens? If the numbers don’t reconcile, who gets notified? Name the branches.
Resources. Links to templates, logins, tools, reference documents. Don’t make the person doing the task hunt for assets.
One page. Maybe two. If your process document is longer than that, you’ve built something that will never be read.
The Test: Have Someone Else Follow It
This step is non-negotiable.
Once you’ve documented the process, have someone who has never done the task before follow your documentation and execute it. Don’t explain anything. Don’t answer questions. Just watch.
Where they pause, your documentation has a gap. Where they do something wrong, your instructions are unclear. Where they ask a question, you missed a step.
Update the documentation based on what you observe. Then run it again.
This is the most uncomfortable part of the process, because you will almost certainly find that your first version is inadequate in multiple places. That’s the point. You’re not testing the person. You’re testing the documentation.
A process document that has been tested is one someone can actually follow. Untested documentation is just a theory.
What Level of Detail Is Right?
A question that comes up constantly: how detailed does the documentation need to be?
The answer is: detailed enough that the intended person can execute it without asking you questions, and no more detailed than that.
If you’re documenting for a skilled contractor who has done similar work before, you need less detail. If you’re documenting for someone brand new to the role, you need more. The documentation should match the capability of the person doing the task, not the capability of the person writing it.
Dan Martell makes a useful point in Buy Back Your Time: aim to document at 80% of your quality standard. If someone follows your documentation and produces a result that’s 80% as good as what you’d produce, that’s a success, not a failure. Their execution will improve over time. You’re not trying to clone yourself perfectly. You’re trying to transfer enough to free yourself.
Building the Habit
The goal isn’t a complete operations manual. The goal is a practice.
One task documented per month, tested, refined, and handed off, produces twelve documented processes per year. In three years, that’s a business where the majority of routine work runs without the founder.
That’s not a manual. That’s infrastructure.
The Camcorder Method is low effort to start. Pick the task that takes the most of your time this week that isn’t strategic. Record yourself doing it. Share the recording. See what happens.
The question “how do I document processes in my business” has a practical answer. The harder question is whether you’re willing to spend the hour it takes to create the documentation instead of just doing the task again.
The entrepreneurs who build scalable businesses are the ones who answer that question the same way, every time: the hour I spend now buys me back every hour I’d spend doing this forever.
Where to Start Right Now
If you’re ready to begin, here’s the sequence:
Pick one repeating task that’s currently yours and shouldn’t be. Record yourself doing it using Loom or a screen recorder. Write a one-page checklist from the recording. Have someone follow the checklist without help. Note the gaps. Fix them. Hand off the task.
That’s the whole process. The first one is always the hardest because you’re building the habit. By the third or fourth documented process, it becomes routine.
And routine is exactly what you’re trying to build.
Adam Dellos is the founder of Being In Action Coaching & Consulting, working with business owners and leaders who are building businesses that work without them in every single role.
