Yeah, a flair or a robot is way quicker than a powered espresso machine.
I've been trying to optimise my workflow using a stopwatch and doing as much in parallel as possible. The key is to have water boiling and beans grinding simultaneously, and then milk heating and espresso extraction simultaneously.
I can make a flat white and be all cleaned up and packed away withing 4mins.
Process:
add water to kettle and start boiling
add beans to grinder and start grinding
get robot off shelf and put into position with scale
put milk into French press and in the microwave with time set to 1min (but not yet started)