Automation 101
Everybody can do with more time in their day.
Automation freaking rocks...
... but for a moment, let’s pretend you don’t love it as much as I do. Why should you care about automation?
The most important reason for me is time leverage. In other words – Getting more stuff done in less time. Automation is a bit like investing money, except with your time. You spend some time now to set it up, and it continues to pay you back forever.
There’s more than that though. It helps:
Take the pressure off – Everyone is always so busy. They’ll tell you that “there just aren’t enough hours in the day.” You don’t have to deal with this. Automation helps you free up headspace.
Scale your business – When you & your team are more productive, it’s easier to justify the next hire. Work on more important things - Nobody likes working on mundane or repetitive tasks. Once you have automated these, you’ll have more time to work ON your business.
Stay focused – Switching between tasks is costly to mental energy. Removing tasks from your plate helps you stay focussed on profit-making work.
Reduce human error – When humans do things, mistakes will be made. Give that same task to a computer and it’s done right.
Feel like a wizard – Seriously. Creating automations is fun. When you make one work you’ll want to do a dance around the office. Maybe that’s just me.
We’re all too busy
Does it feel like you’re constantly busy? “I’m so busy” has become a default response when someone says hello and asks how you are. Some people even wear being busy like a badge – as if it’s a good thing.
It’s not.
As a business owner you need to focus on the bigger picture from time to time. You need time to think about strategy and direction of the business. Being “busy” robs you of time to do this.
Even worse, it creates a feeling like you HAVE to be busy all the time. It’s happened to me so many times. I’ll take time off to hang out with friends or family and be anxious the whole time like I should be doing something. They call it “entrepreneurial guilt.” But it can be broken.
I began to notice it more once I had started to escape. Once I was on a holiday with some entrepreneurs. Before the first day was over, laptops were out. Of course everyone was working on things that “just had to be done.”
We couldn’t even get a single day into the trip before work happened. It was only a 3 day trip.
Being busy sucks. Entrepreneurial guilt sucks. Not being able to take time off sucks.
These are the reasons I love automation so much. It’s how I’ve been able to reduce that guilt and take more time for myself. Being away from the desk and knowing that stuff is still happening is a great feeling.
The ROI of automation
Time is the most precious resource we have. That’s why it’s become so common for people to say they wish they had more hours in the day. Of course we can’t make more than 24 hour days, but you can absolutely make it feel like you have more time.
The topics of process and automation are so popular among business owners because they contribute to getting more done in the fixed amount of time we have. Getting it right means you get time back.
It takes time to set up automation. That’s why some people never get around to automating – they are “too busy” to set it up. The only way to fix that is to reduce your workload.
You invest time now to get that time back in the future.
Say you spend 1 hour now creating an automation that saves 10 minutes a week. After 6 weeks, you have 10 more minutes for free.
Do this 30 times and it’ll feel like you cheated and found the secret to 25 hour days.
But where do you even start?
Getting started in automation is overwhelming. There are so many possibilities, tools and ideas. It makes taking that first step difficult.
“Where do I start” is the most common question I get. In fact, 80% of people that responded to my automation survey asked this.
There is also a lot to learn. Automation is open-ended – meaning there is no step-by-step guide that will fix everything in your business. It requires a deep understanding of your business and what is possible to automate.
But it’s totally worth it if you want to do less work and still scale your business.
With Kyuda, you’ll learn exactly where to start.
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