“I Can’t Keep Up”: How Automation Saves Managers from Routine (With Real-World Examples)

If you’re a business owner or a manager, your morning probably starts the same way: you open messengers, email, your CRM (if you have one), and Excel. You are immediately met by an avalanche of minor inquiries: “Where is the invoice?”, “Why wasn’t the tracking number (TTN) sent to the client?”, or “Who’s on shift today?”.

Instead of focusing on strategy, you are functioning as an expensive dispatcher. You are putting out fires that you yourself started through micromanagement and relying on manual processes.

According to the Asana Anatomy of Work Index, office workers spend a staggering 60% of their time on “work about work”—searching for information, switching between apps, status meetings, and manual data entry. Only 26–27% of their time is dedicated to the skilled work they were actually hired for.

Automation isn’t about robots taking over the world. It’s about taking robot work away from people (copying, forwarding, cross-referencing) and giving them back the time for human work (communication, sales, creativity).

Let’s look at five real-life scenarios showing how simple algorithms save time, money, and the team’s sanity.

Scenario 1: The Footwear E-commerce Store and the “Manual Entry Trap”

The Problem: Managers were spending almost a full workday to add a batch of 20 new pairs of shoes to the website. The process demanded excessive attention: first, taking photos; then finding data in the warehouse database; copying descriptions and prices into Excel (filling 10 columns); manually renaming photo files; and finally, converting everything into the correct import format for the site.

The human factor was inevitable: copying errors, mismatched photos, and burnout from monotony.

The Solution: A small utility was developed to automatically match data from the warehouse software with the photographs. The manager simply uploads the photos, and the system automatically pulls in the characteristics and imports them into the store’s database.

The Result: Time savings reached 70%. What took a full day is now done in a matter of hours. Managers can process more inventory or dedicate time to customers, and the error rate has been reduced to zero.

Scenario 2: Pizza Delivery: When Seconds Count

The Problem: An operator has just five seconds to tell a customer the pizza delivery time—a question that demands precision, not an “approximate” answer. They need to instantly analyze a complex equation: kitchen load, available couriers (who’s returning, who’s still busy), shift schedules, and road conditions. Previously, operators manually entered the address into Google Maps and tried to estimate the time. This led either to courier downtime or delays and negative customer feedback.

The Solution: An automatic calculation button was added to the operator’s interface. One click, and the route, including current traffic conditions to the specific address, is plotted without manual entry.

The Result: Reduced customer wait time on the line. The accuracy of order planning increased without any additional workload on staff.

Scenario 3: The “Lead Black Hole” in Excel (Climate Equipment)

The Problem: A company selling climate control equipment processed hundreds of dealer requests in Excel. Requests landed in messengers, email, and often got lost in spam. Managers manually transferred them to the spreadsheet, which took hours. It was difficult to track duplicates for the same address, copying led to errors, and dealers had to be manually notified about the request status.

The Solution: A “single window” for applications was implemented.

1. The dealer fills out a simple form on the website.
2. A map marker automatically appears based on the address.
3. A card is instantly created on the manager’s dashboard.
4. Location-based tracking easily identifies duplicates (multiple requests for the same address), which was previously a major headache.
5. When the manager drags a card to the “Accepted” column → the dealer is automatically notified via email (and every time the status changes thereafter).

The Result: Processing speed tripled. The problem of duplicates and manual entry errors vanished. The process became transparent for both sides.

Scenario 4: Repeat Sales and Service (Customer Retention)

The Problem: A company servicing water filters had managers spending the lion’s share of their time cold-calling their database with reminders: “It’s time to replace your cartridge.” This routine work exhausted managers and often irritated customers by its untimely nature.

The Solution: An automated “nurturing funnel” was introduced. The system monitors the maintenance schedule for each client.

1. When the time is right, the client receives an automated notification (via messenger or email) with a service offer.
2. The client can self-schedule the technician’s visit online, without speaking to an operator.
3. The system even processes the payment.

The Result: Manager time savings reached up to 90%. The team can now service a significantly larger customer base, focusing only on non-standard issues instead of mechanical calling.

Scenario 5: Honest Feedback Without Fear

The Problem: Getting feedback after an order is crucial. However, managers often “forget” or consciously avoid asking, fearing negative reviews. As a result, the management doesn’t see the real picture of service quality.

The Solution: An automated feedback request was set up.

1. The order status changes to “Completed”.
2. Two hours later (or the next day), the customer receives a message via messenger/email: “Rate your experience from 1 to 5.”
3. If the rating is 5 → an automatic request follows: “We’d appreciate a review on Google Maps (here’s the link).”
4. If the rating is 1–3 → an instant notification is sent to the Quality Control Head: “Alert! Dissatisfied customer.”

The Result: You receive a constant stream of real feedback. Your Google rating improves (since you only ask satisfied customers for public reviews), and conflicts with unhappy customers are defused instantly, before they post an angry rant on social media.

Why Automation Pays Off

1. Time Savings. If automation saves an employee even 30 minutes a day, that’s 10 hours a month. For a team of 10 people, that’s 100 hours that can be invested in sales, not copying rows.
2. Transparency for the Anxious. Customers and executives love knowing the status. Instead of calling you, they can get an automated report on Friday evening.
3. Scalability. You can process twice as many orders without hiring twice as many people.

How to Know It’s Time to Automate

Conduct an “Irritation Audit”. Ask yourself and your employees:

1. What daily task do you absolutely despise doing?
2. Where do we most frequently copy data from one place to another?
3. What is the single most frequent question customers ask us?

If the answer is repetitive, that task is Candidate #1 for automation.

Where to Start?

The biggest mistake is trying to automate chaos. If the process is bad, automation will just make it a “faster bad process”.

1. Map the Process. Draw the journey of an application from entry to final resolution. Where does it get stuck? Where is time wasted?
2. Start Small. Don’t build a “spaceship” right away. Pick one simple thing: like consolidating applications into a single place or automating the feedback request.
3. Use Flexible Tools. Modern systems (like Tracy) allow you to configure “If A, then do B” logic without coding knowledge, often just by dragging and dropping blocks.

Conclusion

McKinsey research suggests that about 50% of all work activities that are currently paid for could be automated using existing technologies.

The choice is yours: continue paying smart people to copy rows in Excel, or set up a system once and allow your team to make money, develop the product, and connect with customers.

Start small. Automate one process tomorrow. For example, lead collection or payment reminders. Your business (and your nervous system) will thank you.

Dmytro Sikorskyi

December 01, 2025