"It'll save us time" is a nice thought, but it's hard to make a decision on. This module turns that feeling into a number you can compare against what an automation costs — using three simple ideas.
The three numbers that matter
- Hours saved — how many hours a week your team spends on the task today, multiplied by the share of that work an automation can realistically take over. Very few tasks are 100% automatable; someone usually still reviews exceptions or handles the odd case, so a conservative estimate is safer.
- Fully loaded hourly cost — what an hour of your team's time really costs you. That's not just the hourly wage: it includes payroll taxes, insurance, paid time off, retirement contributions, and other benefits. If you don't know your own number, the calculator below starts with a national average.
- Payback period — how long it takes for the money the automation saves to cover what it cost to set up. The shorter the payback, the safer the investment.
Putting it together
The math is simple: hours saved per year × fully loaded hourly cost = what the task is costing you that automation could recover. Subtract any ongoing cost of running the automation, and you have your net annual savings. Divide any one-time setup cost by your net monthly savings, and you have your payback period in months.
Keep in mind that saved hours don't automatically become saved dollars. Unless you reduce hours, the real gain is what your team does with the time they get back — more sales calls, faster customer replies, or simply fewer late nights. That's often worth more than the raw number.
The value that doesn't show up in the math
Some benefits are real but hard to put a price on: fewer typos and dropped hand-offs, faster response times, work that keeps happening when someone's on vacation, and a business that can grow without hiring for every new bit of admin. Treat the calculator's result as a floor, not a ceiling.
Run the numbers on your workflow
Plug in your top-ranked workflow from the last module. Adjust the hourly cost to match your own team if you know it.
Tool: Automation ROI Calculator
Default: U.S. private-industry average (see note below)
Estimated results
364
hours saved per year
$16,799
value of time saved per year
$16,799
net per year, after automation costs
From month one
payback period
That's about 7 hours a week your team gets back for higher-value work.
Default hourly cost of $46.15 is the average total compensation (wages plus benefits) per hour worked for U.S. private industry workers, December 2025 (BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation). Replace it with your own team's cost if you know it. Illustrative only — results assume 52 working weeks and don't account for time spent reviewing the automation's output, ramp-up time, or how your team uses the hours saved.
If the result looks worthwhile, you're ready for the final module: turning this workflow into a real, launched automation.