The first version of an automation project is usually a script. It solves one repetitive task, runs on one machine, and is valuable because it gives time back quickly.
The interesting work begins when someone else needs to use it. That is the point where inputs, failure states, documentation, and repeatability become part of the engineering problem.
Useful is the first milestone
I start with the smallest reliable workflow. Before adding a new abstraction, I want to know which manual step is expensive and what a successful result looks like.
Good internal tooling earns its complexity by removing more complexity from the work around it.
What changes as the audience grows
A personal script can assume perfect input. A shared tool cannot. It needs clear configuration, predictable output, useful errors, and a path for someone else to understand what happened when a run fails.