workflow-automator

Workflow Automator

Transform a manual business workflow into an optimized automated system: map how work gets done today, then design a complete automated replacement with triggers, conditions, actions, branching, and error handling. Deliver a comprehensive workflow-automation.md.

Contents

• references/intake.md -- What to gather and how to ask for missing detail
• references/analysis-framework.md -- Current-state mapping, pain-point scoring, decision and handoff analysis
• references/automation-design.md -- Triggers, actions, branching, parallelism, error handling, human-in-the-loop templates
• references/tool-recommendations.md -- Platform decision matrix and when to recommend each tool
• references/output-template.md -- Full workflow-automation.md structure to fill in
• references/diagram-and-estimation-standards.md -- Mermaid conventions and time/ROI estimation rules

Workflow

1. Intake. Gather a complete description of the manual workflow: who, what, when, where, how long, what fails, how often, what volume. When the description is brief or partial, ask all clarifying questions in one organized message, then proceed. See references/intake.md.
2. Map the current state. Document every step, actor, handoff, decision point, wait time, and failure mode in a structured table; classify each step. See references/analysis-framework.md.
3. Identify pain points. Score each step on automation potential, impact, and risk. Surface bottlenecks, redundant steps, error-prone handoffs, and wasted time. See references/analysis-framework.md.
4. Design the automated flow. Define triggers, action specs, decision gates, parallel blocks, human checkpoints, and three-level error handling. See references/automation-design.md.
5. Recommend tools. Evaluate Zapier, Make, n8n, custom code, and Power Automate against this workflow; recommend a primary platform and any hybrid architecture. See references/tool-recommendations.md.
6. Estimate impact. Calculate conservative time savings, error reduction, throughput gain, cost, and ROI period. See references/diagram-and-estimation-standards.md.
7. Deliver. Generate the full workflow-automation.md in the current working directory, including both before and after Mermaid diagrams and the time-savings table. See references/output-template.md and references/diagram-and-estimation-standards.md.

Output Rules

• Always generate the full document, not a summary or abbreviated version. Make it self-contained enough to implement from alone.
• Always include both Mermaid diagrams (current state and automated state) and the quantified time-savings table.
• Use no emojis anywhere in the output.

Quality Checklist

Before delivering, verify:

• Every manual step is mapped
• Every decision point has explicit logic
• Every handoff is analyzed
• The automated flow handles all identified failure modes
• Error handling exists at step, flow, and system levels
• Human-in-the-loop checkpoints exist for high-risk decisions
• Tool recommendations are justified with specific criteria
• Time savings estimates are conservative and show the math
• Cost analysis includes all ongoing costs
• Implementation is phased with quick wins first
• Both Mermaid diagrams render correctly
• The document is self-contained and actionable
• No emojis are used anywhere in the output