Colleague Asks to Automate His Job. You Can. But What if He Gets Retrenched?

Should you warn the employee of the possible consequences?

You are a programmer working in a large company. Sometimes, an employee asks you if a time-consuming task of his—entering data, performing calculations on it and formatting it into reports, for instance—can be automated. Often, you do. But usually, the person who wanted to save the company time and money is retrenched. Should you warn the employee of the possible consequences?