What the record already says.

Offices have been automated badly for thirty-five years, and the failures are well documented. We write about what that record shows and how we work because of it. Every number here belongs to whoever measured it.

8 September 2026. 5 minute read.

Seventeen minutes of work. Twenty-two days in the building.

An insurer told Michael Hammer that number in 1990. It is still the number that decides whether AI does anything for a back office.