SOP and Runbook Writer
Write one SOP or runbook anyone can follow cold: trigger, prerequisites, imperative steps, expected results, rollback, and escalation.
Before & after
Same prompt, same agent — the only difference is the skill.
A good SOP audit should look at the completeness and accuracy of your procedures. You'll want to check if they're up to date and if they actually reflect how things are done now. Make sure they have clear steps and that someone can follow them without getting stuck. It's helpful to talk to the people who actually do the work to see if the SOPs match reality. You might want to check if there are any processes that don't have SOPs yet. Creating a consistent template for your SOPs can help ensure they're all structured the same way. You could assign someone to review and update them regularly. Would you like suggestions on how to organize and structure your SOPs?
SOP AUDIT RESULTS
5W2H COMPLETENESS SCORECARD
SOP: 'Onboard new team member' (2025-01, last updated 2026-03)
Who: HR + manager (CLEAR)
What: 15-step process (CLEAR)
When: Duration? No. ADD 'Total time: 4 hours'
Where: Remote or office? No. ADD 'Location: office for day 1'
Why: Purpose stated? Yes (employee productivity)
How: Steps detailed? Partial. Step 7 'Configure laptop' lacks concrete details
How much: Budget/resources? MISSING. ADD 'Hardware budget: 2k per employee'
Score: 5/7 (71%)
SOP: 'Incident communication cascade' (2024-11)
Status: STALE (8 months old, org restructured 3 months ago)
Issue: Lists 'VP Engineering' as escalation (role eliminated, CTO now)
Gaps: No timeline ('notify within X minutes?'). No success criteria.
Action: Archive to 'Archive/Incident-Comms-v1-Outdated', create new version
ORPHAN PAGE DETECTION
Pages with no inbound links:
Vendor evaluation process (42 views, 6 months, not linked from procurement page)
→ Link from 'New vendor request' SOP
Broken outbound links:
Sales onboarding links to deleted 'CRM configuration guide' (removed 2026-05)
→ Replace with current 'Salesforce 2026 setup'
MISSING SOPS (ad-hoc processes)
Approve remote work exception (2 per month, ad-hoc since 2025)
Risk: HIGH (no consistency, no audit trail)
Action: Priority 1, create by end of week
Budget reallocation mid-quarter (1-2 per quarter, finance gap)
Risk: MEDIUM (delays decisions, unclear escalation)
Action: Priority 2, document by end of August
RUNBOOK VERIFICATION (5 SOPs sampled)
Vendor offboarding, Step 3 'Revoke access to systems'
Named owner? No. ADD 'Owner: IT Security'
Expected duration? No. ADD 'Est. 2 hours'
Observable success signal? No. ADD 'Success: All 47 systems report access revoked'
Rollback path? No. ADD 'Rollback: Restore from access-control backup (1-hour window)'
Escalation contact? Partial. CLARIFY 'If data not deleted by T+7, escalate to CTO'
CLEANUP ROADMAP
This week: Flag 'Incident communication cascade' stale
Next 2 weeks: Create 'Remote work exception' SOP (high-risk gap)
Next 4 weeks: Update 5W2H scores for top 10 SOPs (target 85%+)
Next 8 weeks: Full wiki audit (link orphans, verify no broken references)About this skill
Procedures fail when the expert is not in the room: at 3am, on a new hire's second day, after someone leaves. This skill turns notes or a walkthrough into one procedure anyone can execute without guessing.
What it does
- Picks the right format: checklist, SOP, or runbook
- Writes one action per step with the exact screen or command and the expected result
- Makes decisions explicit branches and marks rollback and points of no return
- Names escalation by role, channel, and time limit, with no secrets in the doc
- Runs a readiness test and gives a dry-run plan before you rely on it
What you get
A complete procedure in a consistent template with owner and review date, plus a list of [confirm] gaps, or a readiness review of an existing document with exact rewrites.
Best for
Ops leads, on-call engineers, office managers, and founders documenting processes that live in one person's head.
SKILL.md preview
---
name: sop-runbook-writer
description: Write or harden one SOP or runbook so someone who has never done the task can follow it cold - clear trigger and scope, prerequisites and access, numbered imperative steps with expected results, decision points, verification, rollback, escalation, and an owner and review date - then check it with a readiness test and a dry-run plan. Use when the user says "write an SOP for...", "turn my notes into a runbook", "document how we do X", "make this checklist usable by a new hire", "is this runbook good enough for on-call?", "we need a procedure for vendor offboarding", or "nobody but me knows how to do this".
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# SOP and Runbook Writer
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