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7 Signs Your Business Is Ready for Automation

And the signs that actually mean you have a process problem, not an automation problem — automating a broken process just breaks it faster.

Updated July 11, 20265 min read
Quick answer

You're ready to automate if the same task is repeated the same way every time, it's eating hours every week, and mistakes have already cost you money or a customer. You're not ready if the process itself changes constantly, if nobody agrees on how it should be done, or if you don't yet know why it's slow.

Signs you're ready

  1. The same task is done the same way, multiple times a week, by you or your team.
  2. You could write step-by-step instructions for it right now without thinking hard.
  3. A mistake in this task has already cost you money, time, or a customer.
  4. You've caught yourself saying "I really need to stop doing this by hand."
  5. The task is one of the first things that falls behind when you get busy.
  6. Multiple people ask you the same question or need the same thing repeatedly.
  7. You can name the exact tool or software this task already happens inside of.

Signs you have a process problem, not an automation problem

If the way this task gets done changes depending on who's doing it, or if you and your team would each describe the "right way" to do it differently, automating it will just make an inconsistent process fail faster and more invisibly. Fix the process — write down one agreed way of doing it — before automating it.

Related

Back to: Business Process Automation — The Complete Guide

The full pillar guide this article belongs to.

The First 5 Processes Most SMBs Should Automate

A ranked starting list by business type.

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