Which Business Processes Should You Automate First?
Short answer
Start with a process that happens often, follows clear rules, uses digital information, and costs your team noticeable time — but where a mistake is easy to catch and fix.
A quick checklist
- Frequent: it happens daily or weekly.
- Rule-based: you could explain the steps to a new hire in an hour.
- Digital: the information already lives in email, forms, spreadsheets or software.
- Low risk: an error can be spotted and corrected easily.
Good first candidates
- Sorting and answering incoming emails or support requests.
- Copying data between forms, spreadsheets and your CRM.
- Invoice and expense checks before approval.
- Employee onboarding tasks and common HR questions.
Signs a process is not ready
- Every case is handled differently and the rules live only in someone's head.
- The information is mostly on paper.
- A single mistake would be costly or hard to undo.