Quantifying Reclaimed Time
Count the hours at the process level, assign a loaded rate, and name the destination, redeployed to revenue work or eliminated as cost. Time that is freed but reabsorbed by busywork has zero ROI, no matter how many hours it is.
The three-step method
Count, rate, destination. Skip any step and the number is a soft claim that will not survive scrutiny from anyone who controls the budget.
- Count at the process level, which task, whose time, hours before vs after.
- Assign a rate, the loaded hourly cost, or the revenue that hour generates if redeployed.
- Name the destination, revenue work or cost eliminated; if neither, it does not count.
The evaporation trap
Reclaimed hours that are not deliberately redeployed simply evaporate into more low-value work, producing hours "saved" on paper and zero ROI in reality.
Decide where reclaimed hours will go before you deploy the AI. "We will move two hours a day from data entry to outbound calls" is a business case. "It will save time" is a wish.
Frequently asked questions.
Why isn’t "saves 10 hours a week" enough for a business case?
Because saved hours only become money if they are redeployed to revenue or eliminated as cost. Ten hours that get reabsorbed into more email have no ROI. The business case has to name the destination of the time.