What Is the First Step to Approaching Automation?

Choose a recurring situation people can describe and demonstrate. For example: quote requests sit in a shared inbox because nobody knows who should handle the next one. That statement identifies a problem you can investigate. A request to automate the entire business leaves too many decisions unresolved.

Microsoft's business process automation guidance starts its implementation recommendations with mapping today's work. A useful first conversation therefore focuses on the delay, repeated effort or missed handoff that needs attention. Ask the person doing the work to show a recent example, using anonymized information where needed.

Write down what starts the process, the actions that follow and the event that means it is complete. IBM describes process mapping as a way to make steps, owners and timelines visible. A simple sketch or written sequence is enough to begin; check it with the people who actually perform the work.

For the inbox example, your initial map might be: request arrives → staff checks required details → request gets an owner → that person prepares a response. Add the missing-information branch. If nobody can explain who owns incomplete requests, resolve that responsibility before building automatic routing.

Record request volume, hands-on processing time, waiting time and common exceptions separately. These measurements answer different questions. Six minutes of typing and two days waiting for an assignment are different problems, even when they occur in the same request.

Consider a hypothetical business handling 40 requests per week, with an average of six minutes spent copying details for each request. The baseline is 40 × 6 = 240 minutes, or four hours of manual copying per week. That is not a prediction of four hours saved. Review, corrections and support may remain after automation; a pilot must measure the actual change.

Microsoft's flow-design guidance calls for identifying data sources, decisions, process owners and alternative paths. Use those questions to uncover practical constraints: where the request record lives, who may access it and what should happen when essential details are missing.

In the quote-request example, check whether the existing form or CRM can assign an owner using a clear rule. If the team first needs to agree on which department handles each service, a new tool cannot make that business decision for them. Remove an unnecessary handoff or improve the form before deciding how much automation is needed.

Create a short brief with the person responsible for the process. Use these prompts to turn the discussion into an implementation decision.

• Problem: Which recurring delay, error or repeated task are we trying to reduce?
• Boundary: What starts this workflow, and what counts as finished?
• Owner: Who maintains the rules and resolves exceptions?
• Inputs: Which fields, files and systems are required, and is access available?
• Baseline: What volume, processing time and waiting time have we actually observed?
• Exceptions: What happens with missing information, duplicate submissions or a system outage?
• Pilot: What limited change will we test, and how will we decide whether it helped?

AI is not required for every business automation. A defined condition such as assigning a request by service type may be handled with rules and an integration. Interpreting varied free-text requests may justify evaluating AI, with appropriate checks. Make that choice from the task and the quality requirements.

Move toward a pilot when the owner can explain the normal path, common exceptions and the outcome to measure. Keep researching if people still disagree about what should happen. A useful result of this first step can be a simpler manual process, an adjustment to existing software or a scoped automation project.

Choose one bounded change for the first implementation. In the hypothetical inbox workflow, that could be recording a complete request and assigning its owner, while staff continue preparing quotes. Agree on the review period and compare the same measures before and after, including work that remains manual.

Carras Technologies offers workflow mapping, automation assessment and integrations with defined rules and human review. Share the completed brief, the tools you currently use and anonymized examples of normal and incomplete requests. We can assess a suitable approach and confirm the scope before implementation.