Operational Runbook Creator
Create operational runbooks for recurring tasks with step-by-step procedures and checklists
The last time your senior engineer was on vacation, the on-call team couldn't restart the billing service because the steps were in someone's head. Tribal knowledge is a single point of failure — every undocumented procedure is a future incident waiting to happen.
Who it's for: SRE teams documenting incident response procedures, operations managers standardizing recurring processes, DevOps engineers creating deployment runbooks, IT managers building procedures for common support tasks, team leads capturing tribal knowledge before key employees leave
Example
"Create a runbook for our monthly database maintenance" → Step-by-step runbook with pre-checks, execution steps with exact commands, rollback procedures, verification checks, escalation contacts, and estimated time per step — formatted for your wiki
New here? 3-minute setup guide → | Already set up? Copy the template below.
# Operational Runbook Creator
Create a step-by-step operational runbook for a recurring task or procedure.
## Output
```markdown
## Runbook: [Task Name]
**Owner:** [Team/Person] | **Frequency:** [Daily/Weekly/Monthly/As Needed]
**Last Updated:** [Date] | **Last Run:** [Date]
### Purpose
[What this runbook accomplishes and when to use it]
### Prerequisites
- [ ] [Access or permission needed]
- [ ] [Tool or system required]
- [ ] [Data or input needed]
### Procedure
#### Step 1: [Name]
```
[Exact command, action, or instruction]
```
**Expected result:** [What should happen]
**If it fails:** [What to do]
#### Step 2: [Name]
```
[Exact command, action, or instruction]
```
**Expected result:** [What should happen]
**If it fails:** [What to do]
### Verification
- [ ] [How to confirm the task completed successfully]
- [ ] [What to check]
### Troubleshooting
| Symptom | Likely Cause | Fix |
|---------|-------------|-----|
| [What you see] | [Why] | [What to do] |
### Rollback
[How to undo this if something goes wrong]
### Escalation
| Situation | Contact | Method |
|-----------|---------|--------|
| [When to escalate] | [Who] | [How to reach them] |
### History
| Date | Run By | Notes |
|------|--------|-------|
| [Date] | [Person] | [Any issues or observations] |
```
## Tips
1. **Be painfully specific** — "Run the script" is not a step. "Run `python sync.py --prod --dry-run` from the ops server" is.
2. **Include failure modes** — What can go wrong at each step and what to do about it.
3. **Test the runbook** — Have someone unfamiliar with the process follow it. Fix where they get stuck.
What This Does
Creates comprehensive operational runbooks for recurring tasks. Each runbook includes prerequisites checklists, exact step-by-step procedures, expected results, failure handling, verification checks, troubleshooting guides, rollback procedures, and escalation contacts.
Quick Start
Step 1: Download the Template
Click Download above to get the CLAUDE.md file.
Step 2: Set Up Your Project
Create a project folder and place the template inside:
runbooks/
├── CLAUDE.md
├── procedures/ # Generated runbooks
└── history/ # Run logs
Step 3: Start Working
claude
Say: "Create a runbook for our weekly database backup procedure"
What Gets Produced
- Prerequisites checklist — Access, tools, and data needed before starting
- Step-by-step procedure — Exact commands and actions with expected results
- Failure handling — What to do when each step fails
- Verification — How to confirm the task completed successfully
- Troubleshooting table — Symptom, likely cause, and fix
- Rollback procedure — How to undo if something goes wrong
- Escalation contacts — Who to call and when
Tips
- Be painfully specific — "Run
python sync.py --prod --dry-runfrom the ops server" beats "run the script" - Include failure modes — What can go wrong at each step and what to do about it
- Test the runbook — Have someone unfamiliar follow it and fix where they get stuck
Example Prompts
"Create a runbook for our weekly database backup procedure"
"Build a runbook for deploying to production"
"Document the monthly SSL certificate renewal process"
"Create a runbook for onboarding a new microservice"