How to see where a business leaks time and money

When people look for waste, they look inside roles: is this person fast enough, is that tool good enough. The larger leaks are almost always in the gaps between roles, at the handoffs where work waits, gets re-entered, or falls through.

Map a single process end to end before you try to fix anything. Write down every step, who does it, what triggers it, and what has to be true before the next step can start. The delays and the double-entry show up on their own once the whole chain is on one page.

Only then is it worth asking what AI changes. A tool that speeds up a step nobody was waiting on saves nothing. A tool that removes a handoff, or lets a decision be made without a meeting, changes the shape of the whole process.