Experience Doesn’t Protect You From Autopilot
Hi all 👋
I did a presentation on Wednesday this week. Something I've done for over ten years now, same field, same principles, same outcome we're shooting for. It went okay, but afterward I sat with why it didn't feel like I'd rocked it, and I think it's because I got complacent. Didn't prep as well as I should have, didn't set proper intentions going in, and had a couple of things in there that probably should've been cut for that audience.
I asked the client for constructive criticism at the end. Still waiting to hear back; followed up again today. But maybe that's the actual lesson: watch how you're showing up and stay open to being told you missed something, because complacency creeps in quietly.
That one’s worth sitting with. Moving on to the business end…
What's Happening in AI
OpenAI recently shut down Atlas, the standalone browser they launched with a lot of fanfare as a Chrome competitor, nine months after launch. I don't read that as the tech failing. Almost nobody was willing to switch browsers just to get it, so OpenAI folded the same capabilities into ChatGPT Desktop and ChatGPT Work instead, tools people already had open.
That's discipline, not retreat. They didn't kill the ambition; they killed the standalone bet and moved it into a channel people were already using. The harder move is admitting a channel isn't working and redeploying fast, instead of defending it to save face.
Worth asking: Is there a standalone tool or process in your business that you're propping up out of habit, when the outcome it's supposed to deliver could just as easily ride on something people already use?
This Week's Case Study
A lot of operational work runs on people for one reason: nobody's stopped to ask why it should. That's what we found with fixed-term staff contract renewals at a university, thousands processed by hand every year, with no one tracking the real volume. When one slipped, an employee's contract just wasn't ready when they needed it.
We automated the renewal workflow: the system picks up the request, generates the contract, and sends it straight to the employee.
- Roughly $50,000 to $75,000 per employee back in HR admin costs a year.
- Processing time dropped about 75%, from an estimated 1,556 hours a year to 389.
- Contracts go out on time without anyone chasing paperwork.
If nobody in your business can remember the last process someone actually questioned, that's usually where the real cost is hiding.
→ Read the full case study.
A Useful Resource
One question I get quite often is: "How do I know if a process is actually worth automating?"
That's why we built the Administrative Tax Calculator. It shows you how much you're paying premium salaries to do low-value work, chasing updates, manual entry, bridging gaps between systems. Before you hire another person, see how much you're already losing to broken processes.
That's it for this week.
— Robbie
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Hi all 👋
I did a presentation on Wednesday this week. Something I've done for over ten years now, same field, same principles, same outcome we're shooting for. It went okay, but afterward I sat with why it didn't feel like I'd rocked it, and I think it's because I got complacent. Didn't prep as well as I should have, didn't set proper intentions going in, and had a couple of things in there that probably should've been cut for that audience.
I asked the client for constructive criticism at the end. Still waiting to hear back; followed up again today. But maybe that's the actual lesson: watch how you're showing up and stay open to being told you missed something, because complacency creeps in quietly.
That one’s worth sitting with. Moving on to the business end…
What's Happening in AI
OpenAI recently shut down Atlas, the standalone browser they launched with a lot of fanfare as a Chrome competitor, nine months after launch. I don't read that as the tech failing. Almost nobody was willing to switch browsers just to get it, so OpenAI folded the same capabilities into ChatGPT Desktop and ChatGPT Work instead, tools people already had open.
That's discipline, not retreat. They didn't kill the ambition; they killed the standalone bet and moved it into a channel people were already using. The harder move is admitting a channel isn't working and redeploying fast, instead of defending it to save face.
Worth asking: Is there a standalone tool or process in your business that you're propping up out of habit, when the outcome it's supposed to deliver could just as easily ride on something people already use?
This Week's Case Study
A lot of operational work runs on people for one reason: nobody's stopped to ask why it should. That's what we found with fixed-term staff contract renewals at a university, thousands processed by hand every year, with no one tracking the real volume. When one slipped, an employee's contract just wasn't ready when they needed it.
We automated the renewal workflow: the system picks up the request, generates the contract, and sends it straight to the employee.
- Roughly $50,000 to $75,000 per employee back in HR admin costs a year.
- Processing time dropped about 75%, from an estimated 1,556 hours a year to 389.
- Contracts go out on time without anyone chasing paperwork.
If nobody in your business can remember the last process someone actually questioned, that's usually where the real cost is hiding.
→ Read the full case study.
A Useful Resource
One question I get quite often is: "How do I know if a process is actually worth automating?"
That's why we built the Administrative Tax Calculator. It shows you how much you're paying premium salaries to do low-value work, chasing updates, manual entry, bridging gaps between systems. Before you hire another person, see how much you're already losing to broken processes.
That's it for this week.
— Robbie
