My boss would probably prefer—thinking short-term—that I work by that chart. I would prefer to learn something new, and it usually pays off in the long-term, possibly years from now in unexpected and unforeseeable ways.
"This may help in unexpected and unforeseeable ways" doesn't sound like the most convincing argument for taking time from your job to learn a new skill.
All the same, you are choosing to learn something new, not to automate something to save time. Learning something new by automating a task which doesn't justify automation is no different from say reading a book or doing coding exercises in the same time - it's potentially a good use of your time, it just doesn't relate to the xkcd chart at all.