data.day
automation / efficiency / human-middleware

If We Copy-Paste It Twice, We Automate It

We call it 'Admin.' It is actually waste. Moving data from Excel to SAP is not a job for a human. It is a structural defect in your operations.

Ingrid Pipeline Ingrid Pipeline

The $100,000 Typo

We had a shipment of steel beams. They were supposed to go to Site A (Oslo). They arrived at Site B (Bergen). That is a 7-hour drive across the mountains. We had to hire a rush crane. We missed the install window. The cost? $15,000 in delays.

Why did it happen? Because a junior admin was copying the address from a PDF purchase order into the dispatch system. He was tired. He hit Ctrl+V in the wrong row. It was a small slip. It had a heavy consequence.

The Bottleneck: Human Middleware

We rely on people to bridge the gap between systems.

  • The Supplier System speaks PDF.
  • The Internal System speaks SQL.
  • The Bridge is a human.

This is a bottleneck. A human can process 10 records a minute. A script can process 10,000. But worse, the human gets bored. When humans get bored, we lose focus. Our eyes glaze over. We are not built for repetitive data transfer. We are built for problem-solving.

Asking a human to act like a robot is bad management.

The Pipe: Connect the Ends

We implemented a rule: “Two Strikes.” If we see a task being copy-pasted twice, we build a pipe.

We used a simple integration tool.

  1. Trigger: Supplier sends email.
  2. Parse: Tool reads the PDF. Extracts the address.
  3. Push: Tool inserts the order into the dispatch system.

It took one day to build. It runs instantly. It never gets tired. It never pastes into the wrong row.

Liberate the Talent

The junior admin did not get fired. He got promoted. He stopped being a data entry clerk. He started analyzing supplier performance. He found a way to consolidate shipments that saved us 10% on freight.

He had the brain for it. We just had to stop using his brain as a clipboard. Look at your office. Find the people who are typing what is already on a screen. Stop them. Build the pipe.

FAQs

But automation is expensive to build.

Human error is more expensive. One wrong digit in an invoice can cost thousands. Automation pays for itself in reliability.

Will this take away jobs?

It takes away the boring parts of the job. The Coordinator can now focus on route planning or vendor negotiation. We upgrade the role.

What if the API breaks?

APIs break loud. You get an alert. Humans break quiet. You don't know about the typo until the truck arrives at the wrong city.