The adoption of rules of procedure can be a time-consuming business. In Bolivia it took 5 months to decide finally on the rules of procedure. In East Timor where initially the UN had given the country 90 days to adopt a constitution, the first 2-3 weeks were taken up by the adoption of rules of procedure. Much could be done to prepare the way for the adoption of these rules. Unless the process of adopting such rules is to be either, on the one hand, rather automatic and unreflective or, on the other, excessively time-consuming, it may be best for some thought to be given to this question in advance of the convening of the Constituent Assembly. This paper describes in detail what a constituent assembly is, looks at its tasks, and discusses what rules of procedure it should seek to achieve. In addition, it describes what the necessary legal framework should be and gives some guidelines on how to draft rules of procedure.