How much time does your company lose on manual work? How to calculate it

Why manual work stays invisible

Five minutes to copy data from an email, ten to find the right file, a quarter of an hour on a phone call asking about a status. On their own, these are trifles. Multiplied by the number of people and working days, they can add up to a full-time position.

A four-step method

1. List the repetitive tasks. Retyping data, preparing documents, compiling reports, checking statuses, reconciling data between departments.
2. Estimate how long a single task takes and how many times a day or a week it is done.
3. Count how many people do it.
4. Convert the result into hours per month.

Example: if three people each spend two hours a day retyping data, then with 21 working days that comes to 126 hours a month - almost a full-time position.

What time alone does not show

• Errors. Every manual retyping carries a risk of mistakes, and sorting out mistakes takes time too.
• Delays. The client waits because the document is not ready, and decisions are made on outdated data.
• Team fatigue. Experienced employees do work that a system could take over.
• Dependence on one person. When that person is away, the process slows down or stops.

A real-life example

In one project, the accounting department prepared 500-800 contracts every month, along with the accompanying documents. After the process was analyzed and a document generator was implemented, the company now saves the equivalent of a full-time position every month. See the case.

What to do with the result

The number of hours is the best argument in any conversation about automation, because it shows the real scale of the problem rather than a general impression. Start with the tasks that take the most time and are the most repetitive - that is where automation delivers results fastest. If you would like to go through these calculations for your company, book a consultation.