Productivity
Beginner
16 min
Problem-first thinking — start from your calendar, not from the tool
The problem
You save AI tool recommendations. You have a folder of them. You follow three newsletters and you can name twenty tools.
The workflow
1Capture the week
2Split recurring
3Attach minutes
4Restate as problems
5Rank by cost
6Pick top three
★Build
What you need
Role: Finance manager, 60-person manufacturing company, Coimbatore. - Chasing department heads for their monthly numbers — every month, 4 hours, and I hate it - Building the monthly MIS pack — monthly, 6 hours - Vendor payment queries on email — daily, 45 minutes - GST return prep — monthly, 5…
The tool
Your own calendar and sent-items folder
The prompt
Subscribers. The full prompt is part of the SMEMinds AI Playbook. See plans.
What comes back
Ranked by annual hours: 1. Vendor payment queries — 45 min × 5 days × 48 weeks = 180 hrs/year.
Verify before you use it
Human review required. Check every line below before this leaves your screen.
- Check the arithmetic yourself — 45 minutes daily really is 180 hours a year, and that number surprises almost everyone. Confirm the frequency assumption (48 working weeks, not 52).
- Is the mechanical/judgement split right? Only you know whether the variance explanation is genuinely judgement or is actually a repeated narrative.
- Did it list any task you did not provide? Delete it.
- Is any 'mechanical' part actually compliance-critical? GST prep is mechanical and high-consequence — that combination changes how much review the workflow needs, not whether to build it.