Who it is for
For anyone who wants to connect their tools and hand the repetitive work to AI, step by step, with no developer required.
Small Business & Operations / Intermediate
The Automation Playbook
Connect your tools and let AI handle the repetitive work — step by step, no developer required.
The problem
It starts with the situation you're actually in.
Most automation advice starts in the wrong place. It hands you a tool, shows you a flashy demo, and assumes you'll figure out what to point it at. This book takes the opposite approach.
Want to know whether you have a system or just a pile of automations? Ask one question: if you stopped touching everything for thirty days, would your operation get better, stay flat, or quietly degrade? A pile degrades.
Outcomes
What you'll be able to do.
An automation is four things, in order
You'll see why circling a task on a worksheet isn't the same as automating it. The gap between "I want to automate my invoice follow-ups" and a working automation is wider than it looks — and it's exactly where most first builds collapse.
The aisle problem
You'll build a clear blueprint: one trigger, a handful of steps, a decision or two, each arrow labeled with the data it carries.
A test is a question you already know the answer to
A workflow that has never failed in front of you isn't the same as one you can trust. Automations rarely break with an error message — they break with a silent wrong answer nobody notices until a customer replies "this doesn't apply to me" or a finance teammate asks why the numbers are off.
When Automations Start Talking to Each Other
The first automation you trusted enough to stop watching was a milestone. The second one comes easier.
Inside the book
A closer look at the work inside.
Name three candidates
Warm up the muscle now. Open a blank note and write down three tasks from the last seven days that felt mechanical. For each one, answer the five questions with a plain yes or no, then add a rough guess at the minutes it costs you per week.
Same words, different answer
Take two requests that sound identical: "automate our invoices." The first person means: when a new invoice PDF lands in a specific inbox, extract the vendor, amount, and due date, add a row to the accounting sheet, and flag anything over $5,000 for review. Clear trigger, defined steps, one bounded judgment call.
Run a Time Audit That Tells the Truth
You don't need a productivity app or a consultant — just a log and three to five normal working days. Catch the repetitive work as it happens, because by the end of the day you'll have forgotten half of it. Keep a running list.
Before you move on
- You logged three to five normal working days, not an idealized version.
- You tagged each entry R / M / J / O.
- You scored every repeating candidate on all four criteria.
- You have a sorted shortlist of tasks scoring 12 or higher.
- You circled one first project and filled out the reflection prompt completely.
Run a Time Audit That Tells the Truth checklist
- You logged three to five normal working days, not an idealized version.
- You tagged each entry R / M / J / O.
- You scored every repeating candidate on all four criteria.
- You have a sorted shortlist of tasks scoring 12 or higher.
- You circled one first project and filled out the reflection prompt completely.
The Automation Playbook frameworkInside the book
Visual preview
A diagram you can keep open while you work.
Table of contents
8 chapters, built to be read in order.
01
What Automation Actually Is (and What It Isn't)
02
Find Your Automation Goldmine
03
Map the Workflow Before You Build It
04
Choose and Connect Your Tools
05
Put AI to Work Inside Your Workflows
06
Test, Trust, and Troubleshoot
07
Scale From One Automation to a System
08
Your Automation Operating System
186
Pages
12,752
Words
37
Exercises, checklists & tools
8
Chapters
Formats
Three formats. One purchase.
EPUB, PDF, and HTML are included so the book can work on an e-reader, as a designed copy, or as a searchable desk reference.
EPUB
For e-readers and reading apps.
The designed edition with diagrams and layouts intact.
HTML
Searchable, copy-pasteable, and practical as a reference.
Complete guide
The Automation Playbook
$9.99
Intermediate guide pricing
- ✓EPUB + PDF + HTML included in one purchase
- ✓8 chapters from the complete guide
- ✓DRM-free files for your own devices
- ✓7-day refund review for duplicate purchases, access issues, wrong files, or materially defective downloads
Secure checkout / instant download / tax handled at checkout
Before you buy
Questions, answered.
Does this include the full book?
Yes. You get the complete edition, including the chapter sequence and internal materials described on this page.
Which formats are included?
EPUB, PDF, and HTML are included so you can read on an e-reader, keep a designed copy, or use the searchable browser version.
What is the refund policy?
Because this is an instant digital download, broad change-of-mind refunds are not offered after the files have been accessed. Refund requests are reviewed within 7 days for duplicate purchases, accidental purchases before access, access failures we cannot fix, wrong files, corrupted files, or pages that materially misdescribe the book.