Prescribed way of doing something
Introduction to the notion
The PRO3 schema structures the field of the methodology into three main chapters. One of them gathers together the procedures and methods. They are presented as the method’s responses to the question, asked at an individual level: “how should we work?”
A procedure is therefore a way of doing something, generally one that is documented and stipulated, that a worker applies in order to carry out a certain type of task correctly.
“If the process defines the work and the deliverables, we still have to guide the worker and answer the How question, this time at an individual level. The procedure is a way of doing something, an operating mode, a technique – potentially tooled – to execute a task.”
Comment
A procedure is a way of doing something, an operating mode for executing a task.
The notion of procedure differs from that of process by its level of implementation. The process is a response to collective action; the procedure to individual action. To give an example, the process will require the needs to be documented, a deliverable which takes on its meaning in an interpersonal context and at a certain stage of a collective course of action. Producing this deliverable will require us to mobilize several procedures such as, for example, the representation of use cases, the identification of use cases, the evaluation of expectations in terms of quality, the definition of a term, etc.