How are operations at your company? Does everything go perfectly? Do employees make mistakes? Or do things feel chaotic?
Standard operating procedures (SOPs) are a tool businesses use to organize their business and knowledge operations. These guides support companies so that they can have confident, competent, and independent employees.
Unfortunately, the reality is that if your company has poor SOPs your business will probably struggle with operations.
To avoid that struggle, you need to document your company SOPs and make them accessible to your employees.
How do you get started? Watch this 4-minute video for the top five SOPs you should start with so that you can help your business run smoother. And then download your free SOP template packet at the bottom of the page.
1. Employee onboarding & offboarding SOPs
Unless you never intend to hire new employees, you need onboarding and offboarding SOPs. These SOPs help you bring on new hires and say goodbye to former workers.
An onboarding SOP provides a clear step-by-step process for bringing a new hire into your company. This SOP is vital if you ever intend to grow your business.
You determine how and when new hires complete their HR paperwork, what type of training they'll go through, and more for a smooth onboarding process.
An offboarding SOP ensures that knowledge doesn't slip through the cracks when an employee leaves.
This is a checklist, standard article, or how-to guide in the free SOP template packet.
2. Customer service SOPs
One of the first rules in business is to take care of your customers. You want to provide a consistent and positive experience for your customers. Your customer service SOPs help you do that.
A customer service SOP helps your customer-facing employees handle transactions without needing to ask a supervisor for help.
The guides often provide step-by-step instructions on how to complete tasks, like exchanging a product or intaking a call at a contact center.
This is a checklist, standard article, how-to guide, or decision tree in the free SOP template packet.
3. Marketing & sales SOPs
Yes, marketing and sales do take some trial and error. But once you find a successful system, you want to document that process.
Your marketing SOP provides you with a checklist of how to use the different applications, publish content, and perform other marketing tasks.
A sales SOP helps you optimize your sales process. It uses a collection of past experiences so your sales team doesn't waste their time.
This is a checklist or how-to guide in the free SOP template packet.
4. Financial management SOPs
If you're a business owner, this doesn't come as a surprise. You have to track the money coming in and going out to run a successful business.
The more hands that get involved the more difficult that becomes — unless you have clear processes and procedures.
Create financial management SOPs to help your employees process purchase orders, invoices, quotes, payables, bank reconciliations, and more.
This is a checklist, standard article, or how-to guide in the free SOP template packet.
5. Troubleshooting SOPs
Business doesn't always go as planned. Some companies back themselves into a corner when only one person knows how to troubleshoot problems with your software, procedures, or other operations.
Get that information out of your experts' heads with troubleshooting SOPs. These SOPs are a decision tree that helps walk people through how they can identify what the problem is and what they need to do to resolve it.
This is a decision tree in the free SOP template packet.
Capture your SOPs with a free SOP template packet
There are many different types of SOPs and it can be overwhelming to try to get all your SOPs documented. If you get started with these five SOPs, you'll set your business on a path to smoother operations.
With our ScreenSteps knowledge ops solution, we help companies capture their SOPs faster and make those SOPs easy for your employees to access. Employees can find the right (and reliable) guide they need in seconds.
Ready to get started documenting your company's SOPs?
Download the free SOP template packet. This packet has templates for five basic SOPs, including how-to guides and decision trees.
