Zeitworks
In 2019, building on the momentum of Robotic Process Automation (RPA), I co-founded my third AI start-up: Zeitworks. The company pioneered the use of advanced machine learning to identify, optimize, and automate work processes and business analytics.
In our first 4-week pilot with Johnson Financial and West Monroe, Zeitworks deployed sensors to 200 associates, in 164 roles, and our system analyzed 1,468 activities against 66 benchmarks. Zeitworks identified $28M in improvement opportunities and a path to a 48% efficiency ratio for the bank.
Challenge
Organizations were investing heavily in automation, yet most lacked an objective, data-driven understanding of how work was actually being performed across complex, heterogeneous systems. This gap made it difficult to:
Identify the highest-value processes for automation.
Prioritize investments based on real-time cost and efficiency data.
Optimize workflows, onboarding, and supporting technologies without disrupting day-to-day operations.
Solution
Zeitworks developed a continuous process intelligence platform that provided real-time visibility into business workflows:
Continuous, end-point monitoring generated detailed process models with zero disruption.
Finance and HR integrations delivered real-time cost analytics, helping organizations identify the most impactful automation opportunities.
Objective process maps served as the “ground truth” for how work was truly performed, enabling companies to optimize workflows, reduce costs, and increase efficiency.
This approach gave customers the clarity and evidence needed to target automation investments for maximum ROI.
Results
Acquisition: Zeitworks was acquired by Augment.co in 2021, validating the strength of the product and business model.
Pilot Success: In our first 4-week pilot, Zeitworks identified $28M in improvement opportunities and a path to a 48% efficiency ratio.
Market Validation: Delivered four successful pilots with enterprise customers, refining product-market fit and validating demand.
My Role
As Co-Founder, I was responsible for shaping the company from vision to acquisition:
Product Leadership
Defined and drove the product vision, roadmap, and detailed requirements.
Designed core workflows, user personas, admin portal, customer portal, and process editor.
Developed a comprehensive design system, branding, and prioritized roadmap.
Business Strategy
Co-led fundraising, securing a $4M seed round.
Defined and validated the business model, pricing, and go-to-market strategy.
Conducted competitive and market research to guide product positioning.
Execution & Growth
Co-led recruitment of the CEO, CTO, and engineering team (11 FTEs at peak).
Managed a remote development team in India during the first six months.
Drove business development efforts and customer engagement through pilot programs.
Process Discovery
One of the most powerful capabilities of Zeitworks was putting the end user—the workers who’s activities were feeding out engine, in control. We provided these end-users full transparency on the data we were collecting and the models our system was generating.
The end users not only trusted our system, but they actively pointed out areas where they could improve, and where automation could both augment their decision making, and automate task to drive greater overall efficiency.
Managers may have a high level understanding of what their teams do everyday, but frequently employee create their own workarounds and shortcuts. Additionally, all too often the complexity of legacy processes are taken for granted and poorly understood by leadership.
When a new process is discovered, Zeitworks will display what it know about the process, including screen shots, keywords, the people who appear to doing the process, the frequency they perform the process and the time they spend in different applications to complete the process.
Analysts can then use this information to learn more about the process. If they choose to formalize the process, Zeitworks can then calculate the costing information, as well as begin tracking best practices, and recommend ways to optimize the process.
Process Map
A key deliverable for Zeitworks were Process Maps.
These maps allow analysts to clearly see both the “happy path” for each process, as well as the variances that occur and most importantly the costs for associated with each step of the process.
The maps are automatically build by Zeitworks analytics tools, but they could be edited by the customer to rename, add or remove steps from the process.
Combined with detailed cost breakout for each of the enterprise applications used in the process—from Microsoft Office, Slack and email, to legacy ERP and custom applications, customer