A process rethought first, then automated, goes twice as far.

Two questions settle it: how often does the task come round, and what does an error cost? A frequent task whose mistakes are cheap is the best place to start: the gain compounds every week and a failure costs one cycle. A rare task with expensive mistakes is better served by automating the checklist rather than the act itself. Processes that are repetitive, frequent and stable enough for the rule not to change every month are the right candidates; automating a poorly defined process only freezes the disorder, so it is better to clarify it first.

It is settled at design time. Every flow we deliver on a sensitive process ships with its supervision: an alert on failure, a log you can read without us, and above all a named person who receives the alert. A flow that fails silently is worse than no flow at all, because nobody does the task by hand any more.

Yes, and that is where most of the gain sits. A process automated as-is keeps its detours; the same process rethought first, then automated, goes twice as far for the same budget. So we start with an hour alongside the people who do the task, and a step often disappears on its own.

Power Automate for anything that links Microsoft services together: approvals, notifications, file drops, list updates. Development when the logic gets complex, when volume is high, or when cost per run starts to matter. At that stage, once the flow has become central enough to deserve being tested and versioned like a real application, a business application is the sturdier answer. We do both and we have no interest in pushing one over the other.

Your teams, provided it was planned, and it is. Flows are named legibly, documented, and deployed in your environment rather than ours. We train at least one person to read and change them. A flow only the supplier understands is a liability, not an asset.

A simple flow between two tools takes one to two days. An approval route with several levels, exceptions and reminders takes longer, and the time goes mostly on mapping the real process rather than on building the flow.