# The Process Is in Your Head, So Start by Talking It Through When your process lives only in your head, start by talking it through while you do the work, not by writing a manual from memory. This post is for owners who are the main expert in their own business and have no time to write. It explains why experts skip their own steps and gives a short plan to get one process out. ## Why can't you just write it down? You can, but the first version will have holes you cannot see. After years on a job, many steps stop feeling like steps. In a 1999 study, Pamela Hinds found that people with more expertise were worse at predicting how long a novice would need for a task. Common tricks meant to correct that bias did not fix it. The same blind spot shows up in written procedures. The owner writes the steps that feel important. The new hire stalls on the steps that felt too obvious to mention. This is not a lack of care. The more automatic a step becomes, the harder it is to see from the inside. ## Which process should come out first? Pick one process, not the whole business. The right first choice repeats often, could be done by someone else and costs money or a customer when it goes wrong. Quoting, opening the shop, taking a new order and handling a complaint are typical candidates. Leave rare work that needs a lot of judgment for later. It is the hardest to capture and the least often needed. If two processes tie, choose the one a new hire meets first, because it pays back sooner. - It happens every week or more often. - Someone else could do it if they knew how. - A mistake costs money, time or a customer. - You are the person people call when it goes wrong. ## How do you get it out without writing? Talk while you work. Record yourself doing the process once, out loud, as if a new hire were standing next to you. Say what you are looking at and why you choose one option over another. Then record a harder case. Talking is usually quicker than writing, and it catches the small checks you make without thinking. The recording is raw material, not training. It still has to be cut into steps, checked and approved. - Say what you look at before each decision. - Name the exceptions out loud, even the rare ones. - Say when you would stop and call someone. - Call tools, forms and screens by the names your staff use. - Say what you would do if a tool, a part or a person were missing that day. ## Who checks that the steps are complete? Someone who does not know the process yet. The EPA's guidance on SOPs says they should be written by subject-matter experts who do the work. It adds that drafts benefit from being tested by someone other than the writer. In a small business, that tester is your newest employee. Hand them the draft steps and watch them try the process once, without help. Pick a quiet day and stay silent while they work, even when you want to step in. Every question they ask marks a gap. Add each answer to the source, not just to their memory, so the next person gets it too. ## What do you do with the exceptions? Exceptions are where most of the knowledge in your head sits. A routine order is easy to describe. The odd one is where you make a call without noticing that you made it. Treat each exception as a small decision with an owner, not as a footnote at the bottom of the page. - Write the trigger: what the employee will see that makes this case different. - Write the decision: what you do and why, in a sentence or two. - Write the owner: who may make this call when you are not there. - Write the stop point: when the employee should pause and call someone. ## What does a session-by-session plan look like? This is a sample schedule we suggest, not a measured duration. Plan short sessions spread across several weeks rather than one long weekend, and space them to fit your customers. Each session has one output, and the next session starts from it. The plan assumes one process and one helper. Getting one process out of your head, session by session | Session | What you do | What comes out | Who checks it | |---|---|---|---| | Session 1 | Record yourself doing the process once, talking out loud | A raw recording and a list of the steps you named | You, the same day | | Session 2 | Record a hard case and the exceptions you handle | A list of exceptions, each with the person who decides it | You and one experienced employee | | Session 3 | Turn the steps into a draft and hand it to a newcomer | The questions and stalls from one try without help | The newcomer, while you watch | | Session 4 | Fill the gaps and approve the version | An approved source, ready to become a lesson | You, as owner of the process | ## Where does Elvina come in? Elvina takes over after the talking. Your recordings, notes and old checklists go into Company Knowledge, which is available now, and you approve them as the source. Creation Studio turns them into a draft lesson, a one-page job aid and a short quiz, and that drafting is available now. Nothing reaches staff before you approve it, and approval before publication is available now. Your manager then assigns the result to the role on the Learning Platform and sees who finished, both available now. The job aid also sits in the Web workspace, available now, so staff can open it on a phone during the work. Our team handles the drafting with you for now, and Elvina takes on each step once it is confirmed. A messy recording is fine as a start, because you correct the draft before anyone sees it. Elvina does not interview you or decide what your standard is. Staff asking her questions in Chat is planned, not available today. ## How did one sign shop owner get quoting out of his head? A fictional sign shop has one person who can quote a job: the owner. When he is on a site visit or out sick, quotes wait and some customers call another shop. - He records himself quoting a storefront sign, talking through size, materials, permits and the install crew. - A second recording covers a rush job and a landlord who wants drawings first. - His newest designer tries the draft steps on an old job and gets stuck, each time on how the shop checks city sign rules. - He adds the answers to the source and approves it as the first version. - The designer now prepares quotes for simple jobs, and the owner reviews them before they go out. - When the city changes its rules, he records a short update and approves the next version of the source. ## What we would measure Measure whether the process still needs you, not whether a document exists. A falling count of calls about it is the clearest sign that it has left your head. Start counting a few weeks before the first recording, so you have a baseline of your own. - Times per week someone calls or messages you about this process. - Jobs of this type that someone else handled from start to finish. - Questions the newcomer asked on the first try, and how many remain on the second. - Days from a change in how you work to an approved update of the source. - Mistakes in this process, compared with the months before. ## Questions people ask **Q:** What do I do when our process is in my head? Pick one process, record yourself doing it while you talk out loud, and turn the recording into draft steps. Hand them to a newer employee, watch them try once without help, and add every missing answer to the source. Approve that version before anyone trains from it. **Q:** How long does it take to document one process? It depends on the process and how many exceptions it has. Spreading the work over short weekly sessions keeps it from competing with a full day of customers. Count your own time and the newcomer's test, not only the recording. **Q:** Do I need to write an SOP before I can train anyone? No. A talked-through recording, checked by a newcomer and approved by you, is a usable source. You can format it as an SOP later. What matters first is that the steps are complete and that someone other than you can follow them. ## Sources Public sources, checked on the date shown. - Hinds (1999) found that people with more expertise predicted novice task times worse and resisted debiasing meant to reduce underestimation. Source: https://doi.org/10.1037/1076-898X.5.2.205 (checked 2026-10-02). - EPA guidance says SOPs should be written by subject-matter experts who do the work, and drafts tested by someone other than the writer. Source: https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2015-06/documents/g6-final.pdf (checked 2026-10-02). 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