When automation helps — and when it quietly makes things worse

Automation is a force multiplier. That’s the point… and also the risk.

It’s genuinely “survival” once volume and response-time expectations hit. But automating too early (or automating a messy workflow) doesn’t remove friction — it can just scale confusion faster.

What’s worked best for me:

Start by running the process manually long enough to learn the edge cases. Then automate the boring, repeatable parts with clear rules and a human fallback for anything ambiguous.

A simple test before automating anything:

If you can’t describe the workflow in 5–7 steps (including “what happens when it goes wrong”), you’re not ready to automate it yet.

Curious: what’s one workflow you automated that actually stuck long-term — and what made it stable?

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