You know getting SOPs out of your head is an essential part of setting up your systems – both for your own brain space, and to make it easy to bring in support when you need it.
But if you’re anything like me, you’re probably really good at putting it off, too. Maybe the thought of sitting down to write out a step-by-step document makes you want to claw your eyes out. Or, if you’re like me, you do actually love it but simply can’t find the time.
Well my friend, I have great news for you. Because now that we have a bunch of tools at our fingertips, I have a super-simple workflow that creates a video + written SOP in very little time.
Here’s the simple workflow I use to get SOPs out of my head and into action.
The tools you’ll need
- A way to record your screen (I use Zoom)
- A tool to capture the transcript (I use Fathom)
- An AI assistant (I use ChatGPT)
My step-by-step process
- Start a Zoom meeting with your Fathom notetaker.
(Note Zoom does have built-in AI and transcript tools but I haven’t tested them yet). - Open everything you’ll need to show the process from start to finish.
- Share your screen and hit record on Fathom.
When you’re the only one in the meeting you usually have to start Fathom manually.
Note Fathom lets you download the video it captures. If your transcription tool doesn’t allow this, make sure you hit record on Zoom here too. - Complete the task as you normally would, talking through each step as you go.
Explain what you’re doing and why, including any little tips or ‘keep an eye out for this quirk’ you’d normally share.
- End the recording once you’re done. Fathom will automatically generate a transcript.
- Copy your transcript from Fathom and drop it into ChatGPT with this prompt:
“Here’s the transcript of a video I created showing the process to [do this task]. Please create an SOP document based on this transcript.”
And Bob’s your uncle!
ChatGPT will usually produce a nicely formatted document straight away – but if you have a particular SOP template or structure you prefer, you can teach it to follow that format (or even create your own CustomGPT so it’s consistent every time).
With this approach, you end up with:
- a video walkthrough showing exactly how the process works, and
- a written SOP ready to share or hand off.
I always recommend creating both; sometimes you need to see things in action to understand them (video), and for other things you might need to quickly review it or revisit just one section of the process, which is where the written doc comes in handy.
And all it takes is a few extra minutes on top of doing the task itself.
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Once you’ve refined your SOP creation workflow, you can take it a step further:
- Automate it with tools like Zapier. For example, you could automatically send new transcripts from Fathom to ChatGPT or save the generated SOP into a shared folder in Google Drive or Notion. A small bit of setup can save even more time later.
- Prefer screenshots to video? Try the Scribe plugin. It captures screenshots as you go and turns them into a visual step-by-step guide. I still prefer video as my first choice (because it captures nuance and tone), but Scribe can be brilliant for repeatable tasks with lots of clicks or menu navigation.
- Did you know Microsoft Word can generate a transcript from an audio file? Open a new document, go to the Dictate icon on the Home ribbon, and choose Transcribe. Upload your audio file and wait for it to create your transcript.
