OpsByFabian
Fabian Janiszewski
fabian@opsbyfabian.com
+34 656 674 297
opsbyfabian.com
Working manual
Find where time, sales, and control leak out
Use this workbook to inspect your current processes before automating anything. First you understand where the leak is. Then you decide what to fix first.
How to use this workbook
- Print it on A4 or open it on your phone and take notes as you go.
- Block 30 to 45 minutes without interruptions.
- Answer based on how you work today, not how you think you should.
- Tick the boxes and write real examples on the lines.
- By the end you will have a short list of what to review first.
What a workflow leak is
A workflow leak is a point in your process where time, money, information, or follow-up is lost because things are done by hand, repeated, or kept in one person's head. It rarely shows up all at once: you feel it as hours that vanish, customers who do not come back, or numbers nobody can reconcile.
- Work that repeats every week without adding anything new.
- Information that lives only in WhatsApp, Excel, or someone's memory.
- Steps that depend on one specific person being available.
- Things discovered late, once they already cost money.
The 6 leak types
Tick the ones you recognise in your business and note a concrete example next to each.
Time leak
Repeated hours on manual tasks that could be reduced.
Sales and follow-up leak
Quotes and customers that go cold because nobody follows up in time.
Money leak
Margin, payments, or costs that slip through for lack of control.
Control leak
Management cannot see in time what is open, at risk, or stuck.
Knowledge leak
Key know-how that lives in one person and leaves when they do.
Customer experience leak
Slow replies, repeated mistakes, or follow-up gaps the customer notices.
20 audit questions
Answer with a concrete example on the line. Where there is no clear answer, there is usually a leak.
What repeats every week in exactly the same way?
What information lives only in WhatsApp?
What lives only in Excel or loose spreadsheets?
What task depends on a single person?
What data gets copied by hand from one place to another?
What does the owner or management ask for every week?
What problem is always discovered too late?
What gets sent late as a matter of habit?
What customer or quote does not get followed up?
What is still done on paper?
What has to be redone because it went wrong the first time?
What gets searched for repeatedly because it is not at hand?
What question do customers ask again and again?
What step in the process causes the most internal arguments?
What report is prepared by hand every month?
What happens when the key person is off sick or on holiday?
What does the owner approve that a simple rule could decide?
What small error repeats while nobody fixes the root cause?
What task does the team dislike, so it gets delayed?
If someone new joined today, what would be hardest to explain?
Scoring table
Bring the leaks you found above into this table. Score each one from 1 to 5 per column.
| Leak found | Frequency | Time consumed | Money at risk | Owner visibility | Ease of first improvement |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 = low or hard. 5 = high or easy. A leak that is frequent, costly, and easy to improve is a strong place to start.
Prioritization matrix
Place each leak according to its score. Do not try to fix everything at once.
Fix first
Frequent, costly, and easy to improve.
Watch later
Important but not urgent, or not yet clear.
Ignore for now
Low impact or too hard today.
Example leak maps
This is what a process looks like drawn step by step. Sketch your own in the blank space.
WhatsApp order
WhatsApp -> Excel -> invoice
The same data is typed three times. Each copy is a point where something gets lost or wrong.
Quote request
Request -> proposal sent -> follow-up
If follow-up depends on memory, proposals go cold without anyone deciding it.
Stock purchase
Purchase -> delivery -> owner report
If the owner finds out late, buying decisions are always one step behind.
Your process
First improvement planner
Pick a single leak from the Fix first column and answer these questions.
What I will improve first (one thing only):
What I will NOT touch yet:
What data is needed for it to work:
Who will actually use it every day:
How I will know in 30 days if it helped:
Want me to go through it with you?
If you like, we go through what you marked in this workbook on a short call. I tell you where I see a clear improvement and where I do not. No commitment.
This workbook is a diagnostic tool, not a guarantee. Spotting a leak does not promise a specific result or a set saving: every business is different.