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A trigger is an event

A procedure has one entry, and something has to open it. That something is the trigger: the event that starts the work. It is named as an event, with its source. For opening the account, the trigger is "a settled payment arrives across the seam from settling". Anyone reading the procedure can tell exactly what starts it and where that comes from.

A trigger is not a habit. "When someone checks the queue" describes when a person happens to look, not what starts the work, and the work starts later or earlier depending on who is looking. A trigger is not a person noticing either. If the procedure starts when someone sees that something needs doing, it starts only when someone sees it.

A time can be a trigger, when the part really is driven by time: a nightly run, a renewal date, the end of a month. Then the clock is named as the trigger, with the hour or the date. What a procedure cannot have is no trigger at all. A procedure without a named trigger starts whenever someone remembers.

The highest possible standard is to start every procedure with one named trigger (an event with its source, or a named time), never a habit or a person noticing, so that anyone reading the procedure can tell what starts it and where that comes from.

Key Takeaway: The trigger is the event that starts a procedure, named with its source, such as "a settled payment arrives across the seam from settling". It is not a habit, like checking a queue, and not a person noticing. A time can be a trigger when the part is driven by time, and then the clock is named. A procedure without a named trigger starts whenever someone remembers.

A procedure starts when something happens, not when someone remembers.

MarvinPro · PROCESS · Here is How to Build · Design · Procedure · Discipline 2: The Trigger · Section: A trigger is an event

MarvinPro | October 2026

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What must be in hand

The trigger says when the work starts. The entry condition says what the work must have when it does. Sub has already fixed what passes across the seam into the part. The procedure turns that into a short list: the things that have to be present before the first step counts as started. For opening the account, the list is the settled payment, the customer and the plan.

The check on arrival tests that list, and only that list. It is the first step of the procedure, before anything else is touched. A check that tests less lets incomplete work in. A check that tests more starts doing the part's work at the door, and the line between arriving and working blurs.

Work that starts without its list does not fail at once. It stops halfway, at the step that needed what was missing, and waits there while someone chases it. Those stops are the waits nobody planned. Work that fails the check does not wait inside the part. It goes back across the seam by the way back, so the side that can complete it gets it straight away.

The highest possible standard is to give every procedure an entry condition taken from what Sub fixed at the seam, to test exactly that list in the check on arrival before any other step, and to send work that fails the check back by the way back rather than letting it wait inside the part.

Key Takeaway: The entry condition is the short list of what must be present before the first step counts as started, taken from what Sub fixed at the seam. The check on arrival is the first step, and it tests exactly that list, no less and no more. Work that starts without its list stops halfway, in waits nobody planned. Work that fails the check goes back by the way back, not into a queue inside the part.

Work that starts without what it needs does not fail at once. It stops halfway.

MarvinPro · PROCESS · Here is How to Build · Design · Procedure · Discipline 2: The Trigger · Section: What must be in hand

MarvinPro | October 2026

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No side doors

Every way into a procedure runs through its trigger. That sounds obvious, and in most parts it is not true. Work arrives by chat message, by email, by a word in the corridor, as a favour for a colleague. Each of those is a side door. Work that comes in through one skips the entry condition, and so it skips the check on arrival.

Side doors open for good reasons. Someone wants to help a customer sooner, or save a colleague a step. That is why they are hard to see. Nobody thinks they are breaking the procedure. They think they are bending it, once, for a good cause, and then once more.

When a second way in turns out to be needed, there are two options. It becomes the same trigger, with the same entry condition and the same check, or it belongs to another part with its own procedure. A genuinely urgent case does not need a side door either. It goes through the route the Exceptions built, where it is seen, decided and recorded.

The highest possible standard is to let work into a procedure only through its trigger, to turn any second way in into the same trigger or move it to another part, and to send urgent cases through the route the Exceptions built, never through a side door.

Key Takeaway: Every way into a procedure runs through its trigger. Work that arrives by chat, email or favour comes through a side door, and skips the entry condition and the check on arrival. Side doors open for good reasons, which is why they are hard to see. A needed second way in becomes the same trigger or belongs to another part, and an urgent case goes through the route the Exceptions built.

A side door is opened to help. It lets in whatever the check would have stopped.

MarvinPro · PROCESS · Here is How to Build · Design · Procedure · Discipline 2: The Trigger · Section: No side doors

MarvinPro | October 2026

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A real example

Once the procedure for opening the account was written, it started with one trigger: a settled payment arriving across the seam from settling. The check on arrival tested the settled payment, the customer and the plan, and nothing was opened until all three were there.

A few months later, support began sending messages straight to the role that opened accounts. A customer was waiting, the payment was about to go through, could the account be opened now? It was a small favour, and the customer could start a day sooner. The account was opened, and the entitlement recorded, with no settled payment behind it.

Most of those payments did go through. Some never did. Those customers used the software without paying until verify caught it weeks later, and the software was held back from customers who believed they were fully active. They called support, the same team that had asked for the favour.

The fix was not a new rule about favours. It was to close the side door. The trigger stayed the one way in. A request from support now goes to settling, which can speed up the payment, and never to the role that opens accounts to skip it. An account opened without a settled payment is treated as a broken entry, not as a kindness.

The favour opened the account a day early. The check would have saved the customer weeks of confusion.

MarvinPro · PROCESS · Here is How to Build · Design · Procedure · Discipline 2: The Trigger · A real example

MarvinPro | October 2026

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The Trigger

The trigger is the event that starts a procedure, named with its source, or a named time when the part is driven by time. It is never a habit or a person noticing. A procedure without a named trigger starts whenever someone remembers.

With the trigger comes the entry condition: the short list of what must be present before the first step counts as started, taken from what Sub fixed at the seam. The check on arrival tests exactly that list, first and before anything else, and work that fails it goes back by the way back rather than waiting inside the part.

And every way in runs through the trigger. Side doors open for good reasons and let in whatever the check would have stopped. A needed second way in becomes the same trigger or belongs to another part, and an urgent case goes through the route the Exceptions built.

Name one trigger for every procedure, test its entry condition first, and let nothing in by any other door.

MarvinPro · PROCESS · Here is How to Build · Design · Procedure · Discipline 2: The Trigger · Chapter Outcome

MarvinPro | October 2026

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