Before you automate anything, write down how the work really happens

It's a familiar story. A company spends months on new software. It goes live. Within a few weeks, people are quietly back on their old spreadsheets.

The software wasn't broken. It was built around how the work is supposed to happen. But real work is full of little extras that nobody wrote down. There's the quick call to check stock before confirming an order. There's the extra approval one particular customer needs. There's the person in accounts who fixes the figures before they go out. The new system had no room for any of it, so people worked around it.

The fix isn't exciting, but it works: before you automate anything, find out how the work really moves.

Every process has two versions

There's the official version, the one in the procedure document or in the boss's head. It's neat. Step one, step two, approval, done.

Then there's the real version. It's messier, full of phone calls, exceptions and "oh, for that customer we always…". And it's the one that actually keeps the business running.

Automate the official version, and you've automated something nobody actually does.

How to find out what really happens

You don't need special software. A whiteboard and sticky notes, or a plain shared document, is enough. What matters is who you talk to and what you ask.

1. 01Follow one real job from start to finish. Pick a recent order or request and trace exactly what happened to it, with the people who handled it.
2. 02Talk to the people who do the work, not just their managers. Ask them: "What do you do when something is missing or wrong?"
3. 03Notice the waiting, not just the work. Where did the job sit in someone's inbox? Who was it waiting on for a signature? Did it stop because someone was on leave?
4. 04Collect what people actually use. That means the Excel sheets, the forms, the email templates and the printed checklists pinned to the wall.
5. 05Then follow a difficult one. A rush order, a rejected batch, a correction. The awkward cases show you the rules that really matter.

What to write down for each step

• What it's called: a name everyone recognizes, like "waiting for payment approval".
• Who's responsible: the person or role who moves it forward. Not just "accounts", but who in accounts.
• What comes in and what goes out: the information needed, and what's passed on.
• The rules: what decides the next step. For example, order value, type of customer or type of product.
• The exceptions: what happens when the rule doesn't fit, and who decides.
• The hand-over: how the next person finds out it's their turn.
• The time: roughly how long the step takes, and how long the job waits before it.

Deciding what to automate

Once you can see the real process, sort each step into one of three groups:

• Let the software do it. Repetitive steps that follow clear rules. Copying data from one system to another, creating standard documents, sending reminders, sending a job to the right person based on its value or type.
• Let the software help. Steps that need a person but could be quicker. Forms that fill themselves in, suggested values, checklists, all the information needed for a decision on one screen.
• Leave it to people. Judgement calls, customer relationships and genuine one-offs. Software should record what was decided, not try to decide for you.

It's tempting to start with the exceptions, because they cause the most headaches. Usually it's better the other way round. Make the everyday path smooth first. That frees up your people's time for the exceptions. Then give the exceptions their own clear place in the system, instead of forcing them through the normal route.

Seeing where things stand is half the value

When every job moves through clear stages with a named person responsible, anyone can see where it is. Managers stop phoning around for updates. Bottlenecks become obvious. And there's a record of who did what, without anyone having to keep one. Even before you automate a single step, that change alone makes a team calmer and quicker.

Start with one process

Pick a process that happens often, causes real frustration and is reasonably well understood. Get the main path working first, use it on real work, then add to it. Every step teaches you something about your business that you couldn't see on the whiteboard.

That's how we approach process automation. We map how the work really happens, agree the stages and who owns each one, then automate the repetitive parts and leave the judgement to your people. If there's a process that's driving you mad, tell us about it.