What can actually be automated in a company
6 min read
Short answer
The work that automates best repeats, has clear rules, and has its input written down somewhere already — retyping orders, producing quotes from a price list, gathering what invoicing needs, recurring reports, reminders. Decisions that depend on context, and processes where every case is different, are not worth automating.
01How to recognise a good candidate
There are three signs, and all three have to hold at once.
- 01It repeats. At least a few times a week, or the build never pays for itself.
- 02It has a rule. The person doing it can say what they decide on. If they say “you have to see it”, it is not lost, but the rule has to be found first.
- 03The input is readable. The data is in an e-mail, a system, a spreadsheet, or at least a PDF. If it is only in someone's head or on paper in a drawer, start elsewhere.
02Where the saving usually is
Usually not where the company expects. People name the thing that bores them most, but the hours tend to sit in something nobody notices any more.
Most often these:
- 01Retyping data between two systems that do not talk.
- 02Assembling quotes and price lists by hand, from scratch every time.
- 03Collecting what invoicing needs at the end of the month.
- 04Answering the same customer questions that are already answered somewhere.
- 05Finding out the status — people asking each other what stage a job is at.
03What is not worth automating
Work done twice a month. Even at half a day each, the build does not pay for itself and somebody has to maintain it.
Decisions where a mistake is expensive and hard to catch. What can be automated is the preparation for such a decision, not the decision.
A process that is currently changing. Agree what it should look like first, then automate it — otherwise you pay to automate a mess.
04Working it out in advance
Take one process and estimate: how many times a month it happens, how many minutes it takes, who does it and what their hour costs.
For example: retyping an order takes 6 minutes, there are 20 a day, and a warehouse worker does it. That is 2 hours a day, roughly 40 hours a month. Even at a conservative rate that is several hundred euros a month and several thousand a year — and that is the budget the automation has to beat.
If the process turns out to cost €40 a month, leave it alone. That is the honest answer and it saves you more than any tool.
05What always stays with a person
Exceptions. Good automation does not handle everything — it handles 80 to 95 percent of cases and sends the rest to a person, along with why it was not sure.
A system claiming to handle a hundred percent is either wrong or has to be checked in full by somebody, and then you have saved nothing.
Frequently asked
- Which business processes are most worth automating?
- Those that repeat at least a few times a week, have a clear rule, and whose input is already written down. Most often retyping between systems, quotes from a price list, gathering invoicing data, and recurring reports.
- How do I calculate the return on an automation?
- Multiply the number of repetitions per month by the time each takes and the hourly rate of the person doing it. The result is the monthly saving the automation has to beat.
- Does automation have to handle every case?
- No, and it should not try. A good solution handles 80 to 95 percent and passes the rest to a person together with the reason it was unsure.