The SOP Comes Last
As I was putting together my presentation for 1 Million Cups Columbia, MO recently and thinking through our current challenges, I was finally able to give voice to something that has given me pause.
Before I share what it is, I want to state that we are pro-AI here at For the Love of Systems. But we are also realistic about AI (and software in general!), and understand that it has a lot of limitations that users are only just beginning to understand.
With that said, the thing that has given me pause is the use of AI to create Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs).
Can AI be helpful in creating them? Absolutely!
But it has its limitations, and for me, that limitation is around using AI to create brand new processes from scratch that you plan to implement into your company.
In that particular situation, the SOP should come last, not first.
Processes are built from the ground up, and should only be documented into a complete SOP once you’ve tested, iterated, broken, iterated again, gotten feedback from your clients and/or team, and iterated again.
It’s a journey to create and document processes that are human-centered and designed around the ethos of your company, and the journey is what makes the processes strong and unique to your business operations.
Even when we work with brand-new companies to develop processes, we teach them that their processes are absolutely guaranteed to change once they start executing them, and it’s best not to go too deep down the documentation rabbit hole before they’ve been executed multiple times and refined.
For them, it’s better to create checklists with all of the steps and important policies/details quickly jotted down so that the processes stay agile and easily editable. Then, as they solidify, the checklists can be turned into more comprehensive SOPs.
Along the same lines, setting up your processes in software is something that should be done with a similar approach. Leverage the software as you need to, but keep it flexible (which sometimes means doing it manually!) until you’re more certain that the processes are getting you the results you want them to.
Ultimately, using AI to create SOPs before you’ve designed your processes can result in misaligned, generic processes that “work”—but aren’t actually designed with your unique business operations in mind.
If this resonates, consider this your permission slip to slow down on the SOPs and start with the process first. And if you need a guide for that journey, that's exactly what we're here for. Book a Discovery Call and let's build something that actually works for your business.