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DOCUMENTATION DETAIL
ow much detail should be written into a documented
procedure?
This is a frequently asked question that may appear to have a different answer from one
day to the next. This article should help provide sufficient information to enable this
decision to be made more consistently.
This article excludes policy documents, which have requirements of their own.
Contained within this article are the following sections:
The Mountain of Knowledge ................................................. 2
Initial Considerations ........................................................... 3
Additional Considerations .................................................... 6
The Know Line.................................................................... 7
Writing to the Know Line Process .......................................... 8
The Final Say ...................................................................... 9
The concepts of “The Mountain of Knowledge” and “The Know Line” were devised by John Mercer of New Zealand
Steel. The entire article may be printed from the original electronic file copy for the single purpose of being able to read
it. This electronic file may be updated at any time at the author’s convenience which may in turn cause any earlier
prints to become redundant without warning.
This article was originally created and written by John Mercer on 4th July 1997.
H

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The Mountain of Knowledge
Faced with what seems like an impossible job, writing up a documented procedure to
cover a series of activities that resolve into a single “task”, you are confronted with what
seems like a mountain of knowledge on how to do all of this. How much of this
knowledge do you record in a documented procedure?
Let’s consider that “Mountain of Knowledge” that exists for a task. All the details that
could ever possibly be known regarding a particular task, constitutes the Mountain of
Knowledge for that task. When you select a portion of these details and record them, you
produce a documented procedure. The question still is, of course, how much of this
knowledge should be reflected in a documented procedure?
Figure 1
The “Mountain of Knowledge”
To help describe this concept, let’s use a task that we are all familiar with, like “How to
Write Your Name”. Whilst this is a task that is well known to many people, if we were to
ask you to write a procedure for it, how much detail would you include in it?
1. Pick up a pencil.
2. Recall the style of hand writing you would use.
3. Scribe your name.
Is that all there is to it?
What happens if the reader does not have a pencil to pick up? And what is “scribing”? To
explain this to the reader, we would need to include a bit more detail. ie: add another
layer of knowledge underneath this. For example, we would explain the phrase “pick up
a pencil” and we would describe “scribing”.

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Another point: what would cause you to write your name in the first place? We would
need to include sufficient detail so the reader would know when to do this.
What would you add to cover the things that could potentially go wrong? What would
you do if you had a broken pencil? If you think about it, the possibilities are almost
endless.
I would hope that you are now beginning to see that in order to conduct our every day
activities, there is in fact a “Mountain of Knowledge” attached to every thing we do. A lot
of it is pre-learned through life’s experiences, school, etc. Very little of what we do is
written down any where.
An example of what we would write down somewhere, are the telephone numbers we use
from time to time. Why do we write them down? Because we do not remember them.
And that in turn is because we do not use them every day.
From this, we can safely say that repetition aids memory. If we do it or use it often
enough, we can remember it. This then becomes an important consideration in
determining what knowledge to record in order to produce that documented procedure.
Initial Considerations
In applying this to the work place, there are a number of factors to consider.
Let’s consider a simple situation first.
Ask the questions:
“How often is this task carried out by the work force?”
“How many people in the work force do this task?” Then quantify this in terms of
“What percentage of the appropriate or available work force do this task?”. (The
work force could range in number from 4 to hundreds.)
Look up those values on the following chart and see what the score is at the intersection.
Figure 2
Frequency
< 1 / Year 6 5 4 4
≥ 1 / Year 5 4 3 3
≥ 1 / Qtr 4 3 2 2
≥ 1 / Month 3 2 1 1
≥ 1 / Week 3 2 1 0
≥ 1 / Day 3 2 1 0
0% 25% 50% 75% 100%
%age of appropriate/available Work Force (of 4 or more people)
How often is
the task
performed?

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What we are trying to do here is to establish whether or not the task is effectively
embedded within the ‘knowledge’ of the establishment. This in turn determines the
chances that this knowledge could be lost.
An explanation of the score in the chart above is as follows:
0 = Do not document. It is a waste of time documenting something that is carried out
every day by most people in the work force. If someone needs to know something,
then it is more efficient for them to ask someone for an explanation or demonstration.
1 = Mention the task in a document somewhere so that it is recorded that this task needs
to be carried out. Details on how to carry out this task is not required, basically for
the same reasons as for “0” above.
2 = This is probably the first level at which the task itself needs to have any details
recorded. At this level, list the main points of the task. This would not normally
result in a list of more than about 4 or 5 of the most major steps. There would be no
details on how to perform these steps. For example, how to ride a bicycle. Once
learned, never forgotten, except perhaps for things like checking tyre pressures and
looking for loose fittings before riding away. All is needed are some reminders to do
that.
A) Look for loose fittings.
B) Mount the bicycle and check the tyre pressures.
C) Start peddling the bicycle.
3 = The next level of information is to expand on the main points listed in the previous
level of detail. For example:
A) Look for loose fittings:
• Check handle bars firmly attached to the bicycle.
• Check bicycle seat is firmly attached and does not move.
• Check brake levers firmly attached to the handle bars.
B) Mount the bicycle and check the tyre pressures:
• Sit on the bicycle and look to see that the tyres do not bulge excessively.
C) Start peddling the bicycle.
• While seated, begin peddling the bicycle to begin riding.
4 = At this level, all the main parts of the task are listed, including parts not included
under the main points. For example:
A) Take the bicycle out of the garden shed.
• Normally stored behind the lawn mower in the shed.
B) Look for loose fittings:
• Check handle bars do not move within the clamp.
• Check bicycle seat is firmly attached and does not move.
• Check pedals and cranks are firmly attached and turn freely.

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• Check the chain rotates freely around the cogs.
• Check brake levers firmly attached to the handle bars.
C) Mount the bicycle and check the tyre pressures:
• Stand alongside the bicycle and hold onto the grips on the handle bar.
• Lift the leg closest to the bicycle up and over the bicycle so the bicycle is
being straddled.
• Sit on the bicycle seat and look down to see that the tyres do not bulge
excessively where they contact the ground.
• If either wheel rim sits on the tyre bulge, then the bulge is excessive.
D) Start peddling the bicycle.
• Sit on bicycle seat.
• Lift one foot and turn the peddles so the peddle for this foot is sitting
near the top of its arc and is towards the front of the bicycle.
• Start to peddle the bicycle to begin riding.
5 = Here, all additional parts and details of the task are expanded further. For example:
A) Obtain the key from the key rack and unlock the garden shed door.
• The key rack is inside the broom cupboard next to the ‘back door’ of the
house.
B) Take the bicycle out of the garden shed.
• Locate the lawn mower.
• Move the lawn mower to gain access to the bicycle.
• Push the bicycle out of the shed by pushing on the bicycle’s hand grips
on the handle bar.
• Avoid knocking the lawn mower petrol can over when pushing the
bicycle out.
• When at the door, turn the bicycle handle bar slightly to the left and tilt
it towards you to allow the bicycle to be pushed out the door.
6 = Add as much detail as can possibly be documented so it can be used by someone
who has never carried out this task before, nor able to consult with anyone else on
how to do the task.

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Additional Considerations
There are a number of other considerations that also need to be taken into account when
determining how much detail should be incorporated into the documented procedure.
Some of these are as follows:
• Procedural security to prevent loss of detailed knowledge
• Use as basic training material
• Procedural standardisation
• Prerequisite corporate knowledge
• Increasing general knowledge through the use or application of technical
products and processes through time. This would apply in both the corporate
and general society senses.
• Safety requirements.
• Etc., etc.
Knowledge Security
If the work force is small in number (≤3), then it may be expedient to record more detail
than normal to provide safe guards against losing the detailed knowledge when someone
leaves. The amount of detail needs to be balanced against the likelihood of either one, two
or all three people leaving, and what the consequences of the loss of this knowledge
would be.
Training
There are people who are more qualified than myself to offer advice with respect to
training material. However, I would like to raise a couple of questions. Why record
knowledge required for training material that is effectively secure within the corporate
knowledge? Perhaps the resource for this material could be a person who is trained to
train people? By addressing these issues on a wider scale you may save yourself some
writer’s cramp.
Standardisation
Where you have a portion of the work force doing the same job differently and it is having
an impact on productivity or causing other problems, then the need for standardisation
arises. The level of detail required here should be commensurate with the level of detail
where the differences occur.
Existing General Knowledge
Where existing general knowledge covers things like use of spanners, pens, telephones,
etc., then do not document any details about these. The only exception to this would be
where there is a difference between what is required to be done and what one would
normally expect. For example, on some older style telephone systems, there was a need to
lift the handset and then press a specific line number key before speaking to an incoming
call. This difference would need to be recorded because it is different to what one would
normally expect.

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Be aware that what was yesterday’s specialist knowledge, is today’s common knowledge.
The level of detail understood by individual people and how many people have this
knowledge, is fluid, and therefore changes. It is in this area, above all others, where the
greatest perceived differences arise, even to the point of creating arguments between
people. It is in this area where the most amount of care needs to be taken to establish what
is common knowledge and how well it is understood by the work force in general.
Safety
When safety comes into the equation, then there is often a need for more details with
respect to a particular point. In our Bicycle example earlier, it may be necessary to
mention that when entering the garden shed, to lower your head to avoid banging it
against the top of the door way because the door is less than the standard height. This is a
bit of additional detail necessary to carry out a simple, everyday type of job, safely.
The Know Line
Remembering the points from the previous “Additional Considerations” section, it
becomes apparent that there is often a need to vary the level of detail in a document at its
different stages. As we cover the top part of the Mountain of Knowledge through
documenting the procedure, we come down to a level that is appropriate for each step.
Some mountains have snow on them, and how far down they are covered with snow
depends on a number of factors: the season, air temperature, wind direction, humidity,
height of the mountain, etc. The mountain is then covered with snow down to a level
known as the Snow Line.
It would be fair to say then, that we should document our procedures down to a level of
detail known as the documentation “Know Line”. (Refer to Figure 3)
Taking all the previous factors into account, we can, in theory, work out what the level of
detail should be for each step of the procedure.
It is because of this natural variation in the level of detail required within a document, that
one person will say “We need this much”, while some else will say, “No, we need this
much.” We have different views about what is required.
So, how do we get some consistency? The answer is a matter of process.

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Figure 3
The “Know Line”
Writing to the Know Line Process
The way to consistency is to consider the points as presented earlier in this article. This
could be documented as follows:
1. Answer the question: “How often is this task carried out by the work force as a whole?”
2. Answer the question: “How many people do this task?” Then quantify this in terms of
a percentage of the applicable work force.
3. Look up these two values on the chart given in Figure 2. This gives you a base line to
start from.
4. Write a draft procedure to the level of detail as determined by the base line.
5. Examine each step of the procedure and ask what will affect the success of the task
being carried out. Consider:
• What prerequisite knowledge is available? If the knowledge is common, then
you can use less detail. If the knowledge is not well known, then more detail is
required.
• What is the likelihood of the procedural knowledge being lost when people are
sick, on annual leave, or have won a Lotto ticket? The chances of winning Lotto
are greater than getting run over by a bus!

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• Are we experiencing problems with any particular point in the step not being
performed correctly? Some more detail may be required to explain this step to
assist in standardisation.
• What safety issues are involved in the step? If there is some particular hazard,
then more detail is required to explain how to either isolate or mitigate the
hazard.
• Answer the question: “What else can go wrong?” This is to cover anything that
may be peculiar to the step in the procedure not covered by any of the earlier
questions. Remember, we are recording the knowledge of how a task is carried
out to a suitable level of detail so the Reader is able to perform the task.
6. Re-write each step of the procedure, as required, with each of the above being taken
into consideration.
If you can do all of the above in the initial process of producing the draft, then do so.
7. Circulate the document amongst the people who perform this task and get their views.
Whenever they make a comment, consider whether or not it is in reference to one of the
factors listed above. ie: is what you thought to be common knowledge, not so common
after all? Or, vice-versa?
8. Revise the document to account for the comments and suggestions raised. Where
practical, have the document re-reviewed as a final check on your interpretation of
what was said.
9. When all is OK, then issue the document.
The Final Say
This Article is not finished yet. And never will be! There is no “The End” to this article. It
will continue to be re-written or added to, and will evolve as knowledge in this subject
increases.
This is, simply, “How it is, ….. so far!”