As a software developer, I notice quite often the intrinsic motivation of my peers to automate even the smallest tasks.
Oh... I have to type this similar thing 3 times I have to execute this workflow 5 times... Let's automate that... I don't wanna do this by hand.
What happens after this thought... Five hours pass by, the automation for the task, which would've taken 3 minutes by hand, was done, and you feel bad. sometimes...
Automation has its time and place. But, I feel it's quite overused by my fellow people. The temptation is quite big though. We, humans, are quite lazy sometimes, and typing/clicking up the same things over and over again gets strenuous quickly. So this, though, seems quite natural.
Only today, I had the same situation. You need to take a breath in these moments before you decide to automate something and then think about it.
- How long would it take to automate it? However long you think it might take... Multiply that by four. to account for difficulties during the automation process.
Is it still worth it? - Would you use that automation multiple times in the future? Great.
- Can you even fully automate that process, or is some manual human step still needed to complete the task?
If all (or most) of those things indicate that automation is actually needed. Go ahead. I'm the last person to hinder you in that endeavor. But think about it before if you need it, and act accordingly.
Sometimes the best thing to do is to just type/click out that repetitive thing for ten minutes straight.
See ya.