Process vs. Procedure vs. Policy vs. SOP

By Lisa Gonzalez, EOS Implementer® and co-author of Process! (The EOS Mastery Series). Updated October 3, 2026.

A core process is the largest umbrella: Marketing, Sales, Operations, Finance, HR. A sub-process is one piece of work inside it. A procedure is the steps inside a sub-process. An SOP is a procedure, written down. Some teams just call them steps. A policy is none of these. A policy is a rule, and it does not live in process work at all.

Across hundreds of workshops and consulting engagements, I consistently see 5 to 10% of profit leaking out through process gaps. In Process!, I share how one home service business grew from $15M to $30M in two years, with net profit climbing 3 to 10 percent, once its leadership team documented and followed a handful of core processes (Ch. 2).

"When leaders can't even agree what to call something important like a core process, it sends a message to everyone else that you're not at all on the same page." Process!, Ch. 4. That is why this page exists. It is also why the most important section is the one near the end: do not let your team get stuck here.

The terms, side by side, using Marketing

	Policy	Core process	Sub-process	Procedure (also called SOP, or steps)
What it is	A rule	The largest umbrella	One piece of work inside a core process	The steps inside a sub-process
Example	No smoking indoors. Twelve weeks of paid leave for a new baby.	Marketing	Networking. Website management. Email newsletter. Referral partners.	Following up after a networking event: connect on LinkedIn within 24 hours, send a note that mentions something from the conversation, log the contact in the CRM, book a coffee if it is warranted.
Lives in	The employee handbook	Your process documentation	Your process documentation	Your process documentation, one level down
Owner	Leadership, usually through HR	One process owner	The person accountable for that piece of work	The person who does the work
How many	As many as the law and your values require	Five to twelve for the whole company	A handful per core process	Only where a mistake is expensive

What is the difference between a policy and a procedure?

A policy is a rule. It works like a law or a regulation. It tells people what is allowed, what is required, and what is off limits. No smoking indoors is a policy. Twelve weeks of paid leave for a new baby is a policy. Three days of bereavement leave is a policy. A policy does not describe how work gets done. It sets the boundaries that work happens inside.

A procedure is how one piece of work gets done. It is the sequence of steps one person takes to complete one task the right way. Following up after a networking event is a procedure. Some people call it an SOP. Some people call it the steps. It is the same thing.

Policies and procedures never sit in the same document. Policies go in the employee handbook. Procedures go in your process documentation. When a team mixes them, the process document swells with rules that have nothing to do with the work, and nobody reads it.

Policy vs. procedure vs. process

Only two of these three belong in process work.

A core process is the largest umbrella. Marketing is a core process. So are Sales, Operations, Finance, and HR. Most companies have five to twelve.

Inside Marketing sit the sub-processes: networking, website management, the email newsletter, referral partners. Each one is a distinct piece of work with its own owner.

Inside networking sit the procedures. Preparing for an event. Working the room. Following up afterward. These are the steps. Write them down and you have an SOP.

A policy is none of these. It is a rule the company sets, and it applies whether or not any process is running. Bringing policies into process documentation is one of the fastest ways to turn a three-page process into a forty-page manual. Keep them in the handbook.

What is an SOP?

SOP stands for standard operating procedure. It is a procedure, written down in a standard format so anyone qualified can follow it. Process! puts it this way: for each major step in a process, you "briefly explain the who, what, when, where, and how with a series of substeps, which some people refer to as procedures or standard operating procedures (SOPs)" (Ch. 4).

Procedure, SOP, steps. Three words, one thing. The networking follow-up is a procedure when you do it. It is an SOP once it is written down. Your team may just call it the follow-up steps. All three are correct.

One warning. If you try to document everything at this level of detail, you get a binder nobody reads. Document your five to twelve core processes at the 20/80 level first. Write full procedures only for the steps where the cost of a mistake is high.

Do not let your team get stuck here

This is the most important thing on the page. Leadership teams lose entire sessions arguing about whether something is a process, a sub-process, a procedure, or a step. It does not matter. Nobody has ever grown a company by winning that argument.

What matters is that the work is identified, documented at the right level, and followed by all. If your team is debating labels, stop, pick one, and move on. The document will tell you soon enough if it is at the wrong level. Too long and nobody uses it: you went too deep. Too vague to train from: you did not go deep enough. Adjust and keep going.

Frequently asked questions

What's the difference between a process and a procedure?
A core process is the largest umbrella, like Marketing. A procedure is the steps inside one piece of that work, like following up after a networking event. A company runs on five to twelve core processes. Each one holds many procedures.

What's the difference between a procedure and an SOP?
None. A procedure is the steps for one task. An SOP is those steps written down in a standard format. Some teams just call them steps. Use whichever word your team already uses and move on.

What's the difference between a policy and an SOP?
A policy is a rule. An SOP is an instruction. "No smoking indoors" is a policy. "How to follow up after a networking event" is an SOP. Policies live in the handbook. SOPs live in your process documentation. They never share a document.

What's the difference between a policy and a process?
A policy is a rule the company sets. A core process is a major area of work, like Marketing or Finance. A policy applies whether or not any work is happening. A process only exists when work is happening. Keep policies out of process documents.

Is a policy part of process documentation?
No. Policies are rules, like a law or a regulation. They belong in the employee handbook, owned by leadership and HR. Process documentation covers core processes, sub-processes, and procedures. Nothing else.

What is a sub-process?
One distinct piece of work inside a core process. Marketing is the core process. Networking, website management, and the email newsletter are sub-processes. Each has its own owner and its own procedures underneath.

Which should I document first?
The core process, at a high level. Identify your five to twelve core processes and document each one. Our book says one to five pages. Less is more, and if you land at three pages or fewer you are doing great. Add procedures only where getting a single step wrong is expensive.

Who owns each layer?
Leadership owns policies, usually through HR. Each core process has one named process owner. Each sub-process has someone accountable for it. Procedures belong to the people who do the work, with the process owner approving changes.

My team keeps arguing about whether something is a process or a procedure. What do we do?
Stop arguing and pick one. The label does not change the work. Document it, put it in front of the people who do it, and see if it holds up. If the document is too long to use, you went too deep. If it is too vague to train from, go one level down. That feedback settles the question faster than any debate.

If I already call everything an SOP, do I need these other words?
No. Calling every document an SOP is fine. The one distinction that does matter is policy. Rules go in the handbook, not in your process documents. Everything else is vocabulary.