I have an example before this became a thing, and was actually framed as "that's a problem I would love to have".
We were developing software for MS PocketPC, and at one point implemented some registration system that a colleague wanted to approve manually for each user. (Was kind of like a new test or something, can't remember the exact details anymore).
Anyway, me as an developer said: "You care crazy, this needs to be automated, what are you going to do when we get 100 registrations a day?". Business guy responded: "That's a problem I would love to have! I would happily validate 100 registrations per day, because that means we'll have the funds to automate it!".
Long story short, that specific system never took off and automating it would have indeed be a total waste of time.
Since then, I sometimes fall back to the question "is this a problem I would love to have?"
It's actually something I use all the time when on a small team. My argument goes something like this though: "lets work on it when we have an actual problem to solve, right now, we're just making one up." Basically, once manually doing something becomes a part-time job, then it is worth automating. Before then, it is simply an invented problem.
We were developing software for MS PocketPC, and at one point implemented some registration system that a colleague wanted to approve manually for each user. (Was kind of like a new test or something, can't remember the exact details anymore).
Anyway, me as an developer said: "You care crazy, this needs to be automated, what are you going to do when we get 100 registrations a day?". Business guy responded: "That's a problem I would love to have! I would happily validate 100 registrations per day, because that means we'll have the funds to automate it!".
Long story short, that specific system never took off and automating it would have indeed be a total waste of time.
Since then, I sometimes fall back to the question "is this a problem I would love to have?"