After a Month with WorkBuddy: Running Side-Hustle Reports While Watching Kids

Sisters, last night while Little Bao was asleep, I scrolled through a post about automating operations daily reports with WorkBuddy. The gist was that previously, collecting data, organizing metrics, making PPTs, and sending emails took an hour every day, but later it was handed over to WorkBuddy to run on a schedule. What came to mind was: the most draining part of side hustles isn't writing, but finding materials, tracking progress, and figuring out what to post tomorrow. So I opened WorkBuddy and set up a "Side Hustle Daily Report."

My situation is very narrow. Little Bao is two years old. During the day, I only have two hours of nap time. At night, after putting him to sleep, I still need to monitor his condition. I've been using WorkBuddy for about a month. Now I value more how it organizes materials and processes into reusable workflows.

Problem: Not Lack of Tools, But Memory Loss Every Morning

Previously, I manually recorded three things at night: which video wasn't edited, which note was pending publication, and which materials could be reused. Data was scattered across Xiaohongshu (RED), Taobao backend, Doubao chats, and PPT drafts. Sometimes when the kid woke up, my computer wasn't closed, and the next day I forgot what to do. My goal was simple: let WorkBuddy automatically generate a daily report telling me what to do, where I'm stuck, and which materials are usable. The report doesn't need to be pretty; it needs to be idiot-proof.

Solution: Open WorkBuddy, Create Table, Set Scheduled Task

My path was this. Open WorkBuddy, enter the workspace, click "New Project," and name it "Side Hustle Daily Report." Inside, create two folders: Materials and Report Output.

Then create a new table or import a local CSV. A CSV is just a regular spreadsheet file. Fix the headers to six columns: Date, Platform, Topic, Material Location, Status, Tomorrow's Action. Status should only have three values: Ready, Waiting, Done. Don't complicate it; I don't have time to maintain it.

After creating the table, click "Automation" and select "Scheduled Task." A scheduled task executes automatically based on time. I set it to run daily at 21:30 because the kid sleeps around eight, and I have half an hour at nine-thirty. The instruction reads: Read the Side Hustle Daily Report table, tally today's completed items, list tasks waiting for more than two days, pick out reusable materials, generate a 200-word summary, and output a simple PPT version. The next day, I can see the report when I open WorkBuddy.

Here's a key setting. I uploaded a simple PPT template with only four pages: Today's Completed, Tomorrow's To-Do, Material Reminders, Exception Alerts. Fields use fixed names. I tried letting it freestyle, but the text was too dense, and I didn't want to read it. Later, limiting each page to no more than three lines worked better. Personally tested, I haven't enabled email yet; I only checked "Notify me after generation."

Permissions and Pitfalls: Let It Do Only One Thing at a Time

I set permissions for the WorkBuddy project. I am the admin and can modify headers and templates; teammates are view-only, can upload to the Materials folder, but Report Output is read-only. Once, a teammate added materials and casually changed the status to Done, messing up the next day's report. Later, I stipulated that only I can change statuses; others only add links.

For daily maintenance, I only do three things:

• Check if headers have been broken every Friday for five minutes
• Archive old reports to the "History" folder monthly
• Copy a backup before changing templates

This action seems dumb, but it saved me.

My biggest pitfall avoidance experience is letting it do only one thing at a time. Initially, I threw topic selection, editing, publishing, and retrospectives all at WorkBuddy, resulting in scattered outputs. Later, I changed it so the daily report only handles organization, not decision-making. Tools improve organizational efficiency, but deciding which materials are worth keeping still requires my own judgment.

Now, my side hustle daily report takes about five to six minutes instead of twenty. This might not apply to everyone. It lets me avoid forcing myself to remember what I did today at night. When the kid is asleep, I open WorkBuddy, glance at the report, and decide whether to edit videos or write notes first tomorrow.