The decision takes two seconds. The clicking is the work.

Before we built anything, we sat with a small European accounting practice for several weeks. We recorded working sessions, ran a survey with the team and wrote up every routine they repeat each month.

One sentence from those sessions shaped everything since: the decision takes two seconds; the clicking is the work.

Take open items. At the end of a quarter, a bookkeeper goes through a list of small amounts with no invoice behind them. For most of them the answer is obvious: write it off, keep it open, ask the client, or move it to another account. Deciding is quick. Doing it, item by item, screen by screen, is what takes the afternoon.

So we did not set out to build an assistant you chat with. We set out to build something that prepares the work: the list, the reminder, the return, ready for one person to check and approve.

Three things came out of discovery that we still hold to:

• The firm decides. Nothing is booked, sent or filed without a person approving it.
• It works inside what the firm already uses. Switching software costs weeks. Bertha sits on top, it does not replace.
• Time saved is the measure. Not features, not screens. Hours back.

The practice is under NDA, so we will not name it. Its figures stay private too. What we can share is what it taught us, and over the coming weeks we will.