IntermediateLesson 1 of 58 min read
What deserves to be automated
A course from the Academy: Automating without writing code
Go to the quiz ↓Before the tool, the question: what's worth it? Many automations cost more to build and maintain than they save.
The three conditions
It's repetitive. You do it at least once a week, identically. A quarterly task will never pay back its setup.
The rules are stable. If you have to judge case by case, there's nothing to automate: you'd be automating a decision that isn't one.
A mistake can be fixed. Sorting emails, drafting a message, filling in a tracking sheet: a mistake can be corrected. Sending a quote, approving a payment, publishing: no.
The rule of three times
Don't automate anything you haven't done three times by hand. The first two times reveal the edge cases, the third shows you which ones recur. Automating before that means freezing a method you don't yet understand.
What lends itself particularly well
Sorting and tagging incoming messages. Summarising documents as they arrive. Extracting data from a form into a spreadsheet. Preparing a draft reply for a human to review. Monitoring a site and alerting on changes.
The common thread: it prepares, it doesn't commit.
To do now
List three tasks you redo every week. Run them through the three conditions. Often only one will remain, and that's the right one.
Key concepts
Complete the lesson
A 4-question quiz: 3 correct answers are enough, plus an exercise to practise. It opens in the Academy, on this same lesson.
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