Automating a task removes a click. Automating a process removes a handoff. The second is harder and considerably more valuable.
A task is not a workflow
A rule that files an email, a script that renames files, a form that copies itself into a spreadsheet. Useful, cheap, easy to abandon.
Designing the whole process
This starts with a definition: what triggers the work, who is accountable, what a finished state looks like, and what happens when something is wrong. The software comes last.
Most failed automation projects are undocumented processes with software placed on top.
The real test
Whether the tools now being sold as workflow platforms can express exceptions. Every real process is mostly exceptions.
