Workflow automation for small firms

A full workday a week back for each person on your team.

Most small firms still type the same figure five times and rebuild last month's report by hand. I'm William. I build the automations nobody at the firm has time to build: intake, document generation, the handoffs between people.

Get in touch

The same work, before and after

A few situations that might apply to you.

Manual workAfter we build it
The same client details typed into the intake, the agreement and the invoice.Entered once. The rest pull from it.
The monthly report rebuilt from last month's, by hand.Generated the same way every month, ready before it's due.
A rule looked up by opening the document and reading.Ask the question, get the passage it comes from.
Reminders that go out when someone remembers.Sent on a schedule.

Who I've helped

Two builds I've done that are both still in use. An overview of what the teams did by hand, how it runs now, what I built, and some numbers.

6 to 7 hours a week back for the people who did the looking up

Government of Canada · Policy chatbot · 2026

The story

A federal department runs on 220 policy directives. Some are a page, some run to hundreds of pages, and a few are old PDFs that barely open. When someone needs the rule, they find the right directive and read through it by hand. 17,000 staff work under those directives, and the people who look things up most were losing hours a week to it.

What they do now

They type the question and get the answer, with the passage it came from. The people who used to do the most looking up get 6 to 7 hours a week back. Still in use today.

What I built

Two human steps, ask and read. The search between them runs itself.

a person does thisruns on its own
  1. Ask

    A question in plain words.

  2. Search

    The right passages are found across all 220 directives.

  3. Answer

    An answer in plain words, with the passage it came from.

  4. Read

    Check the source if you want to. Rate the answer if it's wrong.

17,000
staff who ask instead of reading
6 to 7 hrs
a week back for the people who used to do the looking up
220
policy documents searched in one go, some of them hundreds of pages
Runs in the department's own accounts. Still in use today.

200 hours of lookups by hand, gone

University of Alberta · Research lab · 2025

The story

A research lab needed to know who was citing 7,000 papers, and where. Each one was a search by hand, about two minutes a paper, so 200 hours of someone's time. The lab's own experiment files, 5,000 of them, sat on one computer and were found by clicking through folders.

What they do now

The lookups run on their own, and what comes out is a map of who cites what, by region, that the lab uses in its talks. The experiment files are in one place, and a researcher can ask in plain words: what did this run show, how does today compare with last week. Still in use today.

What I built

A person at each end. Everything between the folder and the answer runs itself.

a person does thisruns on its own
  1. Hand over

    The list of 7,000 papers and the folder of experiment files. That is the whole input.

  2. Look up

    Every paper is looked up and every citing author pulled, the way a person would, without the person.

  3. Load

    The citations and the 5,000 experiment files go into one place.

  4. Map

    Who cites what, drawn by region.

  5. Ask

    Put the map in the talk. Ask the files a question in plain words and get the answer.

200 hrs
of lookups by hand, gone
7,000
papers tracked without anyone searching
5,000
experiment files that answer a question in plain words
Built at the lab, left with the lab. Still in use today.

What this proves to you

Neither client is in your industry. What carries over:

The shape of the problem is the sameSomebody doing the same lookup by hand, thousands of times, because the answer is buried in documents. Your version has different names on it.
Still in useBoth are running today, without me. Nothing was left half done.
Nobody had to learn a systemStaff type a question. Researchers ask a question instead of clicking through folders. The work they were already doing got shorter.

What usually gets automated first

The jobs that eat a week are rarely the interesting ones. These come up most.

Intake forms that feed everything elsefilled once, and everything after reads from it
Documents generated from one sourceletters, agreements, invoices, summaries
Handoffs between peoplethe email that says "can you add this to the sheet"
Weekly and monthly reportsbuilt the same way each time, and ready when they're due
Chasingreminders that go out without anyone remembering
Spreadsheets only one person understandsmade boring and shared

The offer

Three steps. You see each piece working before you pay for it, and you keep everything at the end.

01

Audit

A 30-minute call. I map where the hours go. You get one page back: what to automate first, what it saves, what it costs. Free, and yours to keep if you stop here.

02

Build

Scope and milestones agreed up front. I build inside the tools you already use where possible, and you see each milestone running before you pay for it.

03

Handover

Documentation, a walkthrough for whoever runs it, and the code. It keeps running without a retainer, and I'm reachable if something changes.

3 principles of Wren

Accountability

Milestones agreed up front, paid after each one meets your needs. Frequent updates and checkins are done to ensure alignment, and actual ROI is personally guaranteed.

Scalability

Built to support a whole team of users. When the team grows or a tool changes, the automations maintain usability and are easy to extend.

Utility

I solve the real problem. If the piece we scoped is not useful or we discover major blockers during development, I'll ensure you still get value from my work.

Why not a bigger agency, a consultant, or one more hire?

Each one is a fair option. Here is where they cost you.

A bigger agencyTheir smallest project is bigger than yours, and the retainer runs whether or not anything ships. Here you pay per milestone, and the person on the call is the person who builds it.
A consultantYou get a recommendation. You still need someone to build it. The audit is the recommendation, free, and the build is the next step.
One more hireA new hire does the typing faster. The typing is still there, and it grows with the client list. Once the job runs itself, the people you have get their week back, and the work they keep is the work that needs a person.

Questions you probably have

Short answers. Ask me the long ones on the call.

I don't know what I'd automate yet. Is it too early to talk?

No. That's what the audit is for. Bring the job that annoys you most and we start there.

What does it cost?

Quoted after the audit, which is free. You pay per milestone, after each one runs, with nothing hourly and no retainer.

Where does our client data go?

It stays in your accounts. I build inside them, copy nothing to my own systems, and my access is removed at handover.

Do we need new software?

Usually not. Most builds run on what you already pay for. If something new is better, I'll say so and you decide.

We have an IT person, or a compliance consultant. Do they get a say?

Yes. They see everything as it's built, and the documentation is written for them.

What if it breaks after you leave?

You have the code and the documentation, so anyone technical can fix it. If it's my mistake, I fix it at no charge.

About

I'm William. I'm a software engineering student at the University of Waterloo, and Wren Automation is the business I'm building.

My work so far has been internships: data cleaning, pipelines that connect systems, and CRMs. The two builds above came out of that work.

I want to get good at this work. The fastest way is to do it for firms that have the problem.

Why me

I have the genuine software engineering qualifications and the technical knowledge to build a reliable system for you. Most agencies can give you something beautifully packaged at demo time, but with hidden bugs and inefficiencies that show up over time.

I'm building a business on this kind of work, and I want each build to be so good that you're not just satisfied, but you want to refer me to every business owner you know. I'm willing to relax the financial terms to get this kind of result.

Thanks for taking the time to read this far.

Get in touch

Tell me what eats away at your weekly hours. I'll reply in a business day with a few times for a quick call.

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Look for an email from [email protected]. Check spam or email me directly if you don't find it. Talk to you soon!