AI Automation To Save 10h A Week Right Now

DEEP DIVE
AI Automation To Save 10h A Week Right Now

If you charge $100/hour, 3 hours of admin per week is costing you $1,200/month.

And most coaches aren’t wasting ONLY 3 hours. (me included)

They’re burning through 10h+ on low-impact stuff AI could do better.

You're not too busy. You're just too manual.

Let’s fix that.

Start With a Brutally Honest Time Audit

First, we need to stop guessing where your time is going.

Here’s a free GPT I built to help you do this audit.

Pro tip: If you’re really hardcore with it, use any time tracker tool and just start logging in your time every day. That’s when you find the real gem

But to start, list the tasks that drain your week. Estimate time spent. (+ be honest)

Common offenders:

• 2h answering basic emails

• 1.5h rewriting or organising call notes

• 1h compiling KPIs or metrics

• 1h onboarding a new client

• 1h writing proposals or invoices

• 3h on cold outreach or follow-ups

That’s ~10+ hours.

These add up over time… and let’s be honest, they’re boring tasks you don’t really want to do anyway.

Of course, these things aren’t necessarily 100% time wasted, someone has to do them.

It just doesn’t have to be you or someone on your team.

What to Keep vs. What to Automate

Now, some stuff is still better done by good ol’ flesh and bones human.

And it’s rarely about fully “replacing” us (yes, I used the R word).

Here’s the rule I follow:

• Keep: Tasks with high emotion, nuance, or human connection

• Automate: Tasks that are repetitive, structured, and info-based

Let me show you what that looks like in real life:

Task: Post-meeting planning
AI-able? Yes

Using something like Otter or Fireflies for the meeting notes and then ChatGPT to digest it and come up with a plan.

Task: Client proposal
AI-able? Yes but with a human in the loop

With a simple n8n workflow you can capture all the clients details and automatically populate a new proposal in something like PandaDoc. All ready to check and send.

Task: 1:1 Client check-in
AI-able? Maybe, but you probably shouldn’t

People can tell when they’re getting an automated email.

This is a high-value tasks and probably worth taking the time to do personally, even if AI can help with nudging you and helping you write the message.

It’s not worth ruining a relationship with a client to save 5min a day.

Go through your list of tasks and make a note for each.

The Only AI Stack You Actually Need

You don’t need a tool for everything.

In fact, if your stack has more tools than you have active clients, something’s wrong.

Here’s what I recommend:

• 1x LLM: ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini

• 1x Automation Platform: n8n (for nerds) or Make (for noobs)

• 1x Workspace/CRM: Notion, Airtable, or whatever you already use

These all have APIs and can be hooked up together with Make or n8n.

That’s the starter pack but also really all 90% of you need.

Be very conscious when adding a new tool to your stack, less is more.

Build Just One Automation This Week

Pick one task that’s:

• Easy to map out

• Annoying to repeat

• Doesn’t require high-touch follow-up

Example:

→ Auto-label incoming emails based on keywords

→ Summarize Zoom calls and send a 3-bullet recap to your CRM

→ Pre-draft email replies to common questions

Start small. You’re building the skill and the confidence.

The goal isn’t to automate your whole business in a weekend.

The goal is to stop wasting hours on things AI can do consistently better than you and get those hours back for real work. You’re already ahead here, so take your time.

Where This Pays Off

If you save 10 hours a week, that’s 520 hours a year.

Even if you value your time at $50/hour, that’s $26,000 worth of capacity freed up.

For most coaches, that’s:

• Another offer you finally have time to build

• Clients you now have space to serve better

• Sleep. Walks. Sanity. You pick.

And it all starts with getting rid of the stuff that never needed your brain in the first place.