Which business processes to automate first: a practical way to pick and cost them.

Most businesses know they spend too much time on admin. Fewer know which part to fix first. The usual mistake is to start with a tool, then look for something to use it on. It works better the other way round: start with the work, measure it, and let the numbers pick.

This guide gives you a method you can do in an afternoon with a spreadsheet. By the end you will have a short list of jobs, a rough cost for each, and a clear first choice.

Start with a list, not a tool

For one or two weeks, ask everyone who does admin to note the jobs they repeat. Keep it simple. For each job, write down:

• What the job is, in one line. For example: "Copy each web order into the accounting system."
• How often it happens: per day, per week or per month.
• How long it takes each time, in minutes.
• Who does it, and roughly what an hour of their time costs the business.
• What goes wrong, if anything: typing errors, late invoices, missed follow-ups.

Do not filter yet. Small jobs that happen fifty times a day often beat big jobs that happen once a month.

What makes a good first candidate

Some jobs are easy to automate and some are not. A good first candidate has most of these traits:

• It follows clear rules. If a new staff member could do it from a written checklist, a computer probably can too.
• The information is already digital. An order in your shop, a form on your website or a row in a spreadsheet is easy to work with. A handwritten note is not.
• It happens often. Daily or weekly jobs save more than yearly ones.
• It is stable. If the process changes every month, wait until it settles.
• Mistakes cost money. A wrong amount on an invoice or a missed follow-up has a real cost beyond the time.

Jobs that need judgement, such as deciding whether to give a refund, are poor first choices. Parts of them can often be automated later, such as gathering the information a person needs to decide.

Work out what each job costs today

For each job on your list, work out the hours it takes in a month:

Hours per month = times per month x minutes each time / 60

Then turn hours into money:

Monthly cost = hours per month x hourly cost of the person doing it

Use the full cost of that person's time, not only their salary. If you are not sure, a simple and honest estimate is better than none.

Here is a made-up example to show the sums. A shop captures 30 web orders a day into its accounting system, about 22 working days a month, and each takes 4 minutes. That is 660 orders and 2,640 minutes, or 44 hours a month. At an hourly cost of R150, the job costs R6,600 a month in time, before counting the cost of typing errors.

Our automation savings calculator does these sums for common jobs, in your own currency.

Work out what the automation would cost

An automation has three kinds of cost. Ask for all three before you decide.

1. Building it. The once-off work to set it up, test it and handle the cases that do not fit the normal pattern.
2. Running it. Many automation tools charge a monthly fee based on how many tasks or runs you use. Some connections also need a paid plan on the apps being connected. Check each tool's pricing page against your real volumes.
3. Looking after it. Apps change, passwords expire and processes move on. Budget a little time each month to check that it still runs.

Find the payback time

Now compare the two. A simple measure is the payback time:

Payback in months = build cost / (monthly cost of the job today - monthly running cost)

A job that pays back in a few months is a strong first choice. A job that takes years to pay back is not, unless it fixes a serious risk such as missed payments.

Also note what the numbers do not show. Faster replies to customers, fewer errors and staff who are not stuck on copy and paste all have value, even when they are hard to price.

Pick your first one

Put your top jobs on two scales: how much they save, and how hard they are to build. Then choose in this order:

1. High saving, easy to build. Do these first. They pay back fast and build trust in automation.
2. High saving, hard to build. Plan these next, once the first one is running well.
3. Low saving, easy to build. Group several together, or do them when there is spare time.
4. Low saving, hard to build. Leave these.

Pick one job to start. One working automation teaches you more than five half-finished ones.

Common first wins

These jobs come up again and again as good starting points:

• Orders into accounting. Each web order creates an invoice in Xero or Sage, with no typing.
• Enquiries into a CRM. Website forms, emails and WhatsApp messages land in one list, assigned to a person, with a follow-up reminder.
• Stock kept in sync. When something sells in one place, stock updates everywhere else, so you do not sell what you do not have.
• Payment reminders. Overdue invoices get a polite reminder on a set schedule, and stop once paid.
• Reports. The weekly sales or stock report builds itself from the source data.

Automation, a software robot, or people?

Not every job suits the same fix.

• Connecting apps works when your systems can talk to each other, usually through an API. This is the cheapest and most reliable kind of business process automation.
• A software robot clicks and types in a system the way a person would. It suits older desktop systems and websites that cannot connect to anything else. We cover this under automation and AI.
• People are still best for work that needs judgement or changes often. Our admin support can take that work off your team, with automation taking over parts of it as the process settles.

Many businesses end up with a mix of all three.

Run the first one well

When you build your first automation:

1. Write the steps down as they happen today, including the odd cases.
2. Decide what happens when it fails. Someone should get a message, and nothing should fail silently.
3. Name an owner in your business who knows what it does.
4. Keep the accounts in your name, so you are never locked in.
5. Measure it after a month. Compare the hours and errors with your starting numbers.

If the numbers look good, go back to your list and pick the next one. If you would like help, we can review your list, cost the top jobs and build the first automation with you.