9 AI Tools to Automate the Worst Parts of Your 9–5

Save 15+ hours a week by 20% of effort going to 80% of success

Why You Need to Use AI at Work

We’ve been sold the lie that busyness equals value. But in reality, the obsession with staying busy just leads to more distractions:

• Meetings that could’ve been emails

• Emails that should’ve been Slack messages

• Slack messages that could’ve been left unsent

It’s hard to find real focus time when your day is constantly being pulled in ten different directions. No matter how early you start, there’s always another ping, question, or request stealing your attention.

A lot of people misunderstand my approach to Lazy Girl Jobs. They assume I’m teaching people how to coast, do nothing, and eventually get fired. That couldn’t be further from the truth.

What I actually teach is how to identify the performative nonsense baked into corporate life and focus instead on the work that actually moves the needle.

One example? Day 5 of my Lazy Girl Job Challenge is about using the 80/20 rule to your advantage. That means learning how to get 80% of your impact from just 20% of your effort.

Because here’s a secret most managers won’t tell you: you’re not evaluated on how busy you look. You’re evaluated on how valuable you appear.

Perceived value looks like:

• Making or saving the company money

• Solving problems quickly

• Being essential to high-visibility projects

It’s not about how many hours you worked, yet no one sits us down and talks about that during our one-on-one’s. It’s really about how strategic you were with your energy.

But here’s the problem: the distractions don’t stop just because you know better. Most of your coworkers will stay addicted to urgency culture. Most of your team won’t help you protect your time. That’s on you.

One way to break free from the noise is by automating repetitive tasks that drain your time and mental energy. These are the quiet energy vampires of the workday. These tiny things add up and slowly erode your motivation and focus.

And it’s why so many of us go from “I’m so excited about this new job!” to “I dread waking up” in just six months. The job didn’t necessarily change, you just got buried under tasks that should’ve never needed a human to begin with.

AI Tools for Work

AI isn’t here to replace you. It’s here to extend you. To give you back time, clarity, and energy to focus on high-impact work. The high-impact work is the kind of work that gets noticed and gets rewarded.

Below is a curated list of AI tools I love and use:

🧠 Meetings (Notta & Otter)

Use it for: Automatically recording, transcribing, and summarizing your meetings. So you can stop frantically typing notes during Zoom calls and actually pay attention.
Price:

• Notta starts at $8.25/month with a free option

• Otter starts at $10/month with a free option
  Time saved: ~2–3 hours/week

📧 Emails (Superhuman)

Use it for: Writing emails in your actual tone of voice. Superhuman feels like having a really smart assistant who knows your sass, your sarcasm, and your calendar.
Price: $30/month
Time saved: ~3–5 hours/week

📆 Calendar Management (Motion & Reclaim.ai)

Use it for: Automatically time-blocking your tasks, meetings, breaks, and even lunch. This is ADHD-friendly scheduling on autopilot.
Price:

• Motion is $19/month

• Reclaim.ai starts at $8/month
  Time saved: ~3–4 hours/week

✍️ Copywriting (Copy.ai)

Use it for: Quickly drafting LinkedIn posts, product descriptions, blog intros, or marketing/sales emails. It’s like hiring a junior copywriter for $49/month.
Price: Free tier available; Pro starts at $49/month
Time saved: ~3–6 hours/week

📊 Presentations (Gamma.app)

Use it for: Turning bullet points or a doc into a sleek, client-ready deck—no PowerPoint headaches required.
Price: Free tier; Paid plans start at $8/month
Time saved: ~2–3 hours/week

📁 Project Management & Reports (Notion + Notion AI)

Use it for: Organizing your entire life in one place. Then letting AI do the heavy lifting—writing reports, summarizing notes, or drafting weekly updates.
Price: Notion AI add-on is $8/month
Time saved: ~3–5 hours/week

📣 Branding & Social Content (Blaze.ai)

Use it for: Automating your content calendar, repurposing your best posts, and keeping your brand voice consistent—without hiring a social media team.
Price: Starts at $39/month
Time saved: ~4–6 hours/week

🎨 Design (Canva AI)

Use it for: Instantly creating beautiful graphics, reels, and decks with even no previous design experience needed. Canva AI is the MVP for non-creatives, like me!
Price: Free tier available; Pro is $14.99/month
Time saved: ~2–4 hours/week

💼 Auto-Apply to Jobs (AI Apply)

Use it for: Job hunting without burnout. Upload your resume, pick your filters, and let it auto-apply to dozens (or hundreds) of jobs while you rest.
Price: Starts at $20–49/month
Time saved: ~8-10 hours/week

Lazy Career Success

Working smarter (not harder) is the most strategic thing you can do in this economy.

Also, if your company hasn’t started talking about how AI can improve workflows, this is your chance to lead the conversation.

If you have a solid relationship with your manager, forward this list and suggest a meeting. Show them how automating grunt work doesn’t just help you but it improves the entire team’s productivity, morale, and output.

The 80/20 rule is a success blueprint. And automating your low-impact tasks is how you make space for high-impact work without burning out in the process.

Let AI take some of the 80. You focus on the 20 that actually matters.

And remember: you’re not lazy, you’re existing in a world obsessed with busyness while trying to be efficient.