Here's a test I use with every team: what do you do every Friday afternoon that makes you sigh before you even start? That task is almost always your first automation.
Before I worked in software, I spent years managing retail stores and later a district of them. I learned that the work that wears people down isn't usually the hard work. It's the small, repetitive stuff: chasing approvals, copying numbers into reports, re-sending the same email. None of it is difficult. All of it adds up.
The good news: you don't need a big AI project to fix it. These five automations work for almost any small team, and most can be built with tools you already have in Microsoft 365.
How to spot a good automation
Not every task should be automated. Use this quick scorecard on a task you have in mind. Tick what's true:
Tasks that score 3 or 4 are your best candidates. Here's roughly where the five workflows below land:
The five workflows
Request intake and approvals
Beginner ⏱ ~1 hour to buildPicture a six-person office. Purchase requests arrive by email, Teams chat and hallway conversations. The manager approves some in her inbox, forgets others, and nobody knows what was approved last month.
⏳ Before
- Requests in five places
- Approvals buried in email
- No record of decisions
✨ After
- One form for every request
- Approve or reject in Teams with one tap
- Every decision logged automatically
How to build it
- Create a Microsoft Form with the details you always need (item, cost, reason).
- Build a flow triggered by new responses.
- Add Start and wait for an approval, assigned to the manager.
- Add a Condition: if approved, email the requester good news; if not, send the manager's comments.
- Save each result to a SharePoint list.
You'll need: Microsoft Forms, Power Automate (Approvals), Teams, SharePoint
⚠️ Watch out: decide who approves when the manager is out. Add a backup approver from the start.
🚀 Level up: route requests over a certain amount to a second approver automatically.
Meeting follow-ups
Intermediate ⏱ ~2 hours to buildA team has a great weekly meeting. Everyone agrees on next steps. By Wednesday, half the action items are forgotten, and whoever writes the recap loses 20 minutes every week.
⏳ Before
- Someone writes notes by hand
- Action items live in one person's notebook
- Recap goes out late, or never
✨ After
- AI drafts a summary from the meeting notes or transcript
- Action items become tasks with owners
- A recap is ready for review within minutes
How to build it
- Agree on where notes live (a OneNote page or a Teams meeting transcript, if your organization allows recording).
- Use an approved AI assistant, like Microsoft Copilot if your organization has it, to summarize decisions and action items.
- Create Planner tasks for each action item with an owner and due date.
- Have the meeting lead review and send the recap.
You'll need: Teams, an approved AI assistant (such as Microsoft Copilot, if licensed), Planner, Outlook
⚠️ Watch out: always tell people when meetings are recorded or transcribed, and have a person check the AI summary before it goes out. AI can miss nuance or get names wrong.
🚀 Level up: create a recap template so every summary has the same sections: decisions, action items, open questions.
Email attachments to the right folder
Beginner ⏱ ~45 minutes to buildInvoices, signed forms and monthly reports arrive by email every day. They sit in one person's inbox, so when that person is out, nobody can find anything.
⏳ Before
- Files trapped in personal inboxes
- Hunting for 'that PDF from March'
- Inconsistent file names
✨ After
- Files saved to a shared folder automatically
- Everyone can find them
- Named with the date so they sort in order
How to build it
- Pick a clear rule: a specific sender, or a keyword like 'Invoice' in the subject.
- Create a flow with the trigger When a new email arrives (V3) and filter by sender or subject.
- Add Create file (SharePoint or OneDrive) for each attachment.
- Put the date at the start of the file name so files sort chronologically.
You'll need: Outlook, Power Automate, SharePoint or OneDrive
⚠️ Watch out: email signatures often include small image attachments. Use the 'only with attachments' and 'include attachments' options, and consider skipping tiny files.
🚀 Level up: send a weekly summary of everything that was filed, so nothing feels like it disappeared.
Weekly reports and reminders
Beginner ⏱ ~1 hour to buildEvery Friday, a coordinator opens a spreadsheet, copies the week's numbers into an email, formats it, and sends it to the team. Same task, same steps, every single week.
⏳ Before
- 30 minutes of copy-paste every Friday
- Report is late when the coordinator is busy
- Formatting changes every week
✨ After
- Report arrives every Friday at 3 p.m., on its own
- Same clean format every time
- The coordinator spends that time on real work
How to build it
- Make sure the data lives in an Excel table or SharePoint list (not loose cells).
- Create a Scheduled cloud flow with a weekly Recurrence trigger.
- Add List rows present in a table to read the data.
- Send an email or Teams post with the key numbers.
You'll need: Power Automate (Recurrence trigger), Excel or SharePoint, Outlook or Teams
⚠️ Watch out: the flow reads whatever is in the spreadsheet. If the data is wrong, the report will be wrong, just on time.
🚀 Level up: start with a simple reminder ('Please update the tracker by Thursday'), then add the report once the data is reliable.
New client or employee onboarding
Intermediate ⏱ ~3 hours to buildEvery new team member means the same checklist: set up accounts, order a laptop, schedule training, send the welcome email. Someone always forgets one step, and the new person's first day suffers.
⏳ Before
- A checklist in someone's head
- Steps forgotten, first days get messy
- Nobody knows what's done
✨ After
- Add a name to a list and the checklist starts itself
- Each task goes to the right person
- Everyone can see progress
How to build it
- Write the full checklist on paper first, with who owns each step.
- Create a SharePoint list for new people (name, start date, role).
- Build a flow triggered when a new item is created.
- Create Planner tasks for each step, assigned to the right owners, with due dates based on the start date.
- Send a welcome email and a Teams post introducing the new person.
You'll need: SharePoint list, Power Automate, Planner, Outlook, Teams
⚠️ Watch out: automating a messy checklist just makes the mess faster. Agree on the steps with everyone involved first.
🚀 Level up: send the new person a short 'first week' guide automatically, a few days before they start.
How to know it's working
Automation should save real time, not just feel modern. Before you launch, write down two numbers:
Time per task, today
Ask the people who do it. Even a rough estimate helps.
How often it happens
Per week or per month. Multiply the two and you'll see the real cost.
After a month, check again: How much time does it take now? Are people actually using it? What still feels clunky? Adoption matters more than features. A simple flow everyone uses beats a clever one nobody trusts.
What not to automate
Hiring decisions, sensitive conversations and complex client issues need people. Automation can gather information; humans should decide.
A personal thank-you or a check-in with a client shouldn't come from a robot. Use automation to remind you, not replace you.
If three people do the task three different ways, align on one way first.
Your 30-day plan
- Week 1Pick and map
Choose one workflow using the scorecard. Write down every step exactly as it happens today.
- Week 2Build the simple version
Build the smallest version that works. Test it with fake data, then with one real case.
- Week 3Launch with the team
Show people how it works in a short meeting. Ask for honest feedback.
- Week 4Measure and improve
Compare time spent before and after. Fix the rough edges, then pick your next one.
If you've never built a flow, start with Getting started with Power Automate. It walks through a version of workflow #1 step by step. And if you'd like a second pair of eyes on your first automation, I'm happy to help.