Chapter 9: Ignore the Hype And Automate What Works
- Admin
- May 19
- 3 min read
Chapter 9 of Operations That Scale
There is no shortage of people telling you to use AI and automation to make everything better/faster/smarter. However, most advice doesn’t account for the reality of running a growing business: small teams, evolving processes and a huge backlog of tasks.
At Compact, we believe automation is a tool not a strategy. Used well, it can save time, reduce errors and create headroom for deep work. Used poorly, it becomes a distraction and overengineers problems that increase, rather than reduce, the burden.
The goal isn’t to automate everything. It’s to automate the right things, and ignore the rest. Below we have outlined three tips when thinking about automations in your organisation.
1. Start with repeatable, low-brainwork tasks
Leaders often want to start by automating complex flows that feel significant (e.g. CRM logic, custom app integrations or Slack bots for everything!). However the best automation comes from simple (often boring), repeatable tasks that waste team time every week.
Great first targets include:
Recurring payments & payroll (don’t let approvals sit in inboxes)
Board pack generation (automate your investor update templates)
Onboarding flows (auto-provision tools and send welcome emails)
Invoice creating and matching (auto-track what’s paid and flag what’s overdue)
If something happens more than once a month and it’s not value-adding work, it could be a sensible candidate for automation.
2. Don’t automate what you haven’t nailed manually
We see this mistake all the time: automating an unclear or broken process.
Your CRM is messy so you build a Zapier flow to update it automatically.
Your team is slow with onboarding so you create an automation that pushes them into Notion.
In these cases, it slows teams down to automate. That’s because automation won’t fix a bad process!
Instead: 1) Do it manually. 2) Document the steps. 3) Iterate. 4) Automate.
3. Not every process needs to be automated
Many tasks still need human judgment, particularly if they are value-adding, or complex. Other tasks change too often to justify the automation effort.
You should skip automation if:
The process is still evolving (e.g. client contracts need bespoke updates every time).
There’s a human decision point in every step.
The frequency is low (one task every quarter isn’t worth building a workflow for).
You need your engineers focused elsewhere (automating ops shouldn’t block product shipping).
At Compact, we don’t apply the “should we automate this?” test the same way you do. We have a lower cost-to-build in many cases and so let us know if you think we could help you automate areas it doesn’t make sense for you to do alone.
Our view: automate to empower, not replace
We believe automation should:
Make your team’s lives easier, not more confusing
Create breathing room for focus, creativity and deep work
Be invisible and reliable, not complex and brittle
Support values-aligned ways of working not extractive hustle
We don’t pitch blanket automation or shiny AI tools. Instead, we focus on the practical, modular and proven:
Start with clear use cases that we’ve already implemented for other clients
Use Make.com, Zapier, Slack, Airtable and Notion to build fast, flexible workflows
Choose tools that don’t require code, engineers or long set-up times
Focus on speed-to-impact (80% solutions that save 5–10 hours a week)
Examples of what we’ve built:
Auto-updating investor dashboards with live cash runway
Automated contract tracking with renewal reminders
RevOps flows that tag deals for upsell based on usage
Automated collection of supplier details and onboarding
Smart monthly reporting from Xero into Google Slides
You don’t need enterprise-grade automation. You need just enough automation to get your time and focus back.
Mistakes to avoid
Automating before validating the process
Automating for show, not utility
Choosing tools that are too rigid or too expensive
Thinking AI = automation
Expecting automation to fix a hiring or management problem
Want to reclaim time without breaking what works?
Compact builds modular, startup-friendly automations that free up your team while keeping things flexible and human. We help you identify the best opportunities, implement fast, and make sure it sticks. Book a call, and let’s make your operations processes smarter.
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