Short answer: list up to five manual workflows, score each on four things, and automate first the one with the most hours that is already clear enough to build. A workflow with unclear steps or unwritten approval limits gets mapped before it gets built.
This is for owners of service businesses with 5 to 50 people. It takes about ten minutes. It runs in your browser and nothing is sent anywhere.
How the four scores work
- Hours a week. How long the workflow takes across the whole team. Your own estimate, not a benchmark. More hours means a bigger payback.
- Steps. Are they written down and the same every time? A workflow can only be built from steps that are agreed.
- Data. Where the inputs live. One or two business systems can be read and written directly. Paper and memory have to be captured first.
- Approval limits. Are the limits on discounts, exceptions and sign-off written down? The workflow then sends a person only what is above them.
Score your workflows
One row per workflow. Common ones are enquiries and first replies, client onboarding, status updates and reports, and invoicing and chasing payment.
Workflow 1
Workflow 2
Workflow 3
Workflow 4
Workflow 5
What happens next
A workflow marked Ready to build or Nearly ready is a candidate for a single AI workflow sprint. Several of them across sales, delivery and finance point to the end-to-end AI ops engine. If automations already exist but some break or overlap, the AI cleanup sprint comes first. A workflow marked Needs groundwork or Map it first starts with a written map of how it really runs.
Sprint prices and running costs are on the pricing page. The result here is a guide, not a quote, and I confirm scope and price in writing before work starts.
Get this scored against your own business
The free diagnostic takes 2 minutes and returns a personalised report on your busiest manual workflow, with the hours at stake and the sprint that fits.
Take the free 2-minute diagnostic Or book a free 15-minute call