Where overhead hides: a map of eight functions
A function-by-function map of where admin overhead hides in a company of 50 to 500 people, the signs to check, and what to fix first.
Devvion · Published
"Our margin dropped two points last year. Revenue grew, headcount grew faster, and when I ask each department head where the time goes, they all tell me they're stretched. They're not lying. I just can't see where it's going."
Overhead in a company of 50 to 500 people rarely sits in one department. It hides in the gaps between them: the handoff nobody owns, the report built by hand, the approval that waits for one person. Every function has its own version. This is a map of eight, with the sign to check in each and the usual first move.
The map on one page
| Function | Where it hides | The sign to check | Usual first move | |---|---|---|---| | Finance | Reconciliations in spreadsheets, approvals chased by email | Month-end takes more than a week | Write the close checklist and approval rules | | Sales and customer | Quotes built from scratch, discounts approved in chat | Quote turnaround measured in days | One template, written pricing rules | | Operations and supply | Orders re-keyed, stock checked by hand | A spreadsheet lives beside the ERP | One source of stock truth, reorder rules | | People | Onboarding by memory, access granted ad hoc | New hires wait days for accounts | A checklist triggered by the signed offer | | Projects and delivery | Status meetings, intake with no priorities | Nobody knows a project is late until it is | One intake, status from the work itself | | Customer service | Same answers typed again, complaints closed without a cause | The same complaint every month | Categories, routing, a link to root cause | | Compliance and risk | Evidence gathered before each audit | Audit prep takes weeks | Processes that leave their own records | | Management | Decisions wait for the founder, reports rebuilt per meeting | The founder approves what a manager could | A written decision-rights matrix |
What it costs
Overhead spread thinly across many people is still overhead. Count the people in these eight functions who spend real time moving information, the hours each loses a week, and what an hour costs you fully loaded.
The eight functions, one by one
Finance. The visible work is closing the books. The hidden work is everything around it: matching bank lines by hand, chasing approvals, re-typing numbers from one system into another, building the same management pack every month. A supplier invoice keyed twice is the classic case, but it's one of many. Start by writing the close checklist and the approval rules down. Matching and posting are easier to automate once those exist.
Sales and customer. Quotes are rebuilt from old ones, pricing exceptions are approved in a chat thread, and the CRM is updated on Friday from memory. The sign is a quote turnaround measured in days. One quote template, written discount limits and one approver usually remove most of the waiting before any software changes.
Operations and supply. Orders arrive by email and phone and are typed into the ERP, then into a warehouse sheet. Replenishment depends on one buyer's judgement. If someone keeps a spreadsheet beside the ERP "just to be sure", that spreadsheet is your overhead. Agree one source of stock truth and write the reorder rules.
People. Each new hire is set up from memory: contract, equipment, accounts, induction. Leave and expense requests move by email. When you hire fast, this is where chaos starts. A checklist that starts when the offer is signed, with an owner for each step, removes most of it.
Projects and delivery. Status is collected in meetings and retyped into slides. New work arrives through whoever shouts loudest. The sign is that nobody knows a project is late until the client says so. One intake with written priorities, and status taken from the work itself, not from a meeting.
Customer service. Agents answer the same ten questions by hand and close complaints without recording why they happened. The sign is the same complaint, every month. Categorise and route complaints, and link each one to a root cause someone owns.
Compliance and risk. Evidence for an ISO or customer audit is gathered in the weeks before it, from inboxes and memory. Access reviews live in a spreadsheet. Redesign the processes so they leave records as they run, and audit prep becomes an export.
Management. This is the most expensive overhead because it slows everyone else. Decisions wait for the founder, reports are rebuilt for each meeting, and KPIs are debated rather than read. A written matrix of who decides what, up to which amount, removes a surprising share of the waiting.
The fixed flow: the overhead every function shares
Tool consolidation and access governance
- Quarterly tool review
- Find every subscription
- Measure real usage
- Overlaps another tool?
- Owner decides
- Move to single sign-on
- Leaver still active?
- Tool register updated
- Fewer tools, clear owners
- Leaver access removed: 3 weeks → 1 day (Example)
One kind of overhead runs through all eight functions: tools. Each team adds its own subscriptions, and over time you pay for several tools doing the same job, with nobody sure who has access to what. The flow above lists every tool and its owner, finds the overlap, consolidates, and puts access on a regular review. It's rarely the biggest saving, but it's the easiest to see, and it makes every later automation simpler because there are fewer systems to connect.
What to do this week without us
- Ask each function head for three tasks their team repeats every week that only move information from one place to another.
- Count the hours for one week. The people doing the work log time, not their managers.
- List the tools per function, with owners and monthly cost. Mark any two that do the same job.
- Check the eight signs in the table. Note which ones you recognised without needing to look.
- Pick one function with the most hours and the weakest sign. Start there, not everywhere.
When to call us
Call us when the hours are spread across several functions and systems, when the same problem shows up in three teams under three names, or when nobody has the time to map it properly.
Devvion starts with the two-week assessment: interviews across all eight functions, a system inventory, a maturity score per process and an overhead number you can take to the board. That's the first of six stages: assess, map, mature, automate, optimise, run. Business consulting maps and matures the processes, and forward-deployed engineering automates them in your stack: our engineer works inside your business, not from a ticket queue. The people you meet stay on your work from the first day to the last. See how this looks in our use cases.
FAQ
Which function usually carries the most overhead?
Devvion most often finds the most hours in finance and operations, because that's where data is re-keyed between systems. The most expensive overhead is usually in management: decisions that wait for one person slow every other function.
Is overhead the same as headcount?
Devvion treats them separately. Headcount is who you employ; overhead is the hours spent on work that only moves information or fixes errors. Cutting people rarely removes that work. It lands on fewer people, and quality drops.
Should we start by cutting tools and subscriptions?
Devvion's view is that tool consolidation is a good early move, because it's visible and makes later automation simpler. It's rarely the largest saving, though. The hours lost between tools usually cost more than the subscriptions themselves.
How does Devvion measure overhead per function?
Devvion counts hours per process during the assessment, from the people doing the work, then groups them by function. You get one overhead number for the company and one per process, measured again after each fix.
Do we need to fix all eight functions?
Devvion rarely recommends it. The assessment ranks fixes by hours recovered and risk reduced against effort. Most companies start with two or three processes in one or two functions, then extend once the first results are measured.