The question is not which tool to use first. The question is which process is worth turning into an operable, measurable and controlled workflow.
Baseline criterion: if there is no owner, available data and acceptance criteria, it is not ready to build.
Before building
- Process frequency and time consumed.
- Systems, documents and data involved.
- Information sensitivity and required permissions.
- What can go wrong if the workflow fails or reads data incorrectly.
- Which step needs human review.
- Expected output and success metric.
Good candidates
- Evidence collection for customers, audits or internal reviews.
- Tickets, approvals and recurring reports.
- Integrations across SaaS, APIs, spreadsheets, databases or documents.
- Control reminders and follow-up on open items.
- Internal summaries using permitted data and known sources.
When to pause
- No one owns the process.
- Sensitive data is not classified.
- The workflow depends on personal credentials.
- There is no reliable API, export or source.
- Autonomy is expected without logs or human review.
- No one can say how the result will be measured.
Healthy closeout
A healthy implementation ends with a working workflow, clear permissions, logs, a manual fallback, tests, an operating guide and formal closeout. Continuity is defined separately.