Choose your own workflow: AI blocks vs custom actions

Workflows are the heartbeat of monday.com. They decide whether your team is flying through tasks or buried under admin. But not all workflows are created the same.

When it comes to automating the stuff that chews through your time, monday.com now gives you two paths:

• Quick AI blocks in the workflow builder

• Tailored custom actions using advanced automation tools

Both have their place. The trick is knowing when to let AI do the heavy lifting and when to roll up your sleeves and fine-tune.

Let’s break it down.

Path 1: monday AI blocks (your quick-start workflow builder)

Sometimes, you don’t need bells and whistles. You just need something that works quickly and effectively. If you're in this camp, monday AI blocks might be best for you.

Think of it as monday.com’s “autopilot mode” inside the workflow builder. You tell it what you want (in plain English), and it builds the workflow for you. For example:

Type in: “When a new lead fills out a form, assign it to sales, send a Slack notification, and update status to Contacted.”

monday AI translates that into a working workflow with the right blocks stitched together.

It essentially builds an easy, streamlined workflow for you within minutes.

When to use AI generated workflows

monday AI blocks are perfect when:

• You’re on an Enterprise plan and want quick automation wins without complex builds.

• You’ve got repetitive actions (like notifications or handovers) you want to automate instantly.

• You need to reduce admin load with simple but time-consuming tasks like email follow-ups or reminders.

• Your workflow is relatively straightforward and doesn’t need multi-branch logic.

• You want to experiment with AI blocks like “Write with AI” and “Summarise with AI” to support tasks like drafting updates, improving text, or auto-summarising meeting notes.

Path 2: Custom actions (your precision toolkit)

But what if your workflow isn’t simple? You might need multiple conditions or specific rules that get triggered at key moments within your setup. That’s where the custom automation builder steps in. It allows you to tailor workflows that reflect the way your business really operates.

The custom automation builder lets you stack conditional logic, mix integrations, and shape every step to fit your process. It’s the difference between letting AI give you a prefab house and designing your dream home, room by room.

Why custom actions matter

With the custom builder, you can:

• Run multi-step automations with layered conditions, ideal when your workflows go beyond 6–7 steps.

• Branch logic using If/Else conditions (e.g., “If client type = VIP, send them the premium onboarding sequence. Else, follow standard.”).

• Pull dynamic values from previous steps and feed them into later actions (great for personalising comms or next steps).

• Use custom variables, control item-level permissions, and apply logic that adapts to your data.

• Unarchive, test, and safely edit workflows without breaking your live setup.

  
  

Custom actions are for teams that need reliability at scale. They make sense when one sloppy rule could ripple across dozens of boards, or when different scenarios need different responses.

When worlds collide: AI inside the workflow builder

Here’s where it gets exciting: you don’t actually have to choose one or the other. monday AI Blocks are fully integrated into the custom workflow builder, meaning you can drop them directly into your automations for smarter, faster decision-making.

Some of the most powerful AI Blocks include:

• Extract with AI: Pull structured data like phone numbers, job titles or custom fields from long-form text (great for parsing resumes or contracts).

• Translate with AI: Instantly convert client messages into your team's preferred language.

• Detect sentiment with AI: Flag negative feedback or urgent tone in customer comms so your team can act fast.

• Summarise with AI: Turn detailed meeting notes into short, actionable bullet points your team can actually use.

• Improve text with AI: Automatically polish client-facing updates for tone, length and clarity.

These blocks give you the speed of AI without sacrificing the structure of custom automation.

Here’s what we recommend (usually)

At Kick Consulting, we see this all the time: teams either overcomplicate things too early, or try to scale on workflows that weren’t built to handle complexity. Spoiler: both approaches backfire.

Our approach?

• Start with AI-generated workflows to get quick wins and prove the value of automation.

• Switch to custom actions as your needs grow—especially if you need conditional logic, integrations or stricter controls.

• Blend the two by embedding monday AI Blocks inside custom workflows. That way, you get the best of both: automation speed and operational smarts.

Need help with your build? Let’s talk

Workflows are not one-size-fits-all. Some days you need fast, auto-built shortcuts. Other days, you need a tailored system that mirrors how your business really runs.

That’s the beauty of monday.com. You get to choose.

So, what’s your next move? Quick wins with AI, or full control with custom actions?

Either way, Kick Consulting can help you design a workflow that saves hours, reduces admin, and scales with your growth. Book a free consult and let’s map it out together.