Technology Consulting

Technology Consulting

Advice from people who will still be here when the build goes wrong.

We consult as engineers who deliver, which changes what we are willing to recommend. Every roadmap we write is one we would be prepared to execute ourselves — and be measured on.

Two advisors reviewing a technology roadmap on a tablet
Fig. 01 — Recommendations we would be willing to deliver

2 wks

to a verdict

Standard value assessment duration

1 in 5

told to stop

Assessments concluding: do not proceed

100%

credited

Assessment fee credited against delivery

The Story

The strategy deck that nobody could execute.

A client showed us a transformation strategy from a well-known firm. It was intelligent, well-researched and entirely correct in its analysis. It was also unexecutable: it assumed a data platform that did not exist, integration capabilities their systems did not support, and a level of process discipline their operation had never demonstrated.

Eighteen months and a considerable fee later, nothing had moved. Not because the advice was wrong, but because the people who wrote it never had to build anything and therefore never discovered what was actually possible.

We consult from the opposite direction. Our recommendations are constrained by what we would be willing to sign a delivery contract for, at a price, against a measured outcome. That constraint removes a great deal of elegant advice from the table — and everything that survives it can actually be done. If we would not build it, we do not recommend it.

Their roadmap was less ambitious than the one we paid far more for, and it is the one we actually completed.

Chief Information Officer Insurance group, United Kingdom
Engagements

Six advisory engagements with a defined output.

Each of these ends with decisions and a costed plan, not a document that describes your business back to you.

Core

Business value assessment

Two weeks with your finance and operations leaders to locate where value leaks and to write the value model: metric, baseline, target, owner, review date.

AI

AI readiness & opportunity review

An honest assessment of where AI would pay in your business, what your data can actually support, and which fashionable use cases to refuse.

Architecture

Architecture & technical due diligence

Independent review of an existing platform, a stalled build or an acquisition target, covering scalability, security, cost, maintainability and key-person risk.

Vendor

Vendor & build-versus-buy assessment

Structured comparison of products against a custom build using your real requirements and total cost of ownership over five years.

Roadmap

Transformation roadmap

A sequenced, costed plan where each phase funds the next, designed so that value arrives before the programme loses political support.

Recovery

Programme recovery

Diagnosis of a failing programme with a blunt assessment of what is salvageable, what should be abandoned, and what it will cost to finish.

Fig. 02 — The value model, agreed with the people who own the numbersFinance in the room from week one
Executives reviewing a value model on screen in a boardroom
Business Outcomes

What good advice is worth.

Each of these is written into the engagement as a number with an owner, a baseline and a review date.

OUTCOME 01

Money stops going to the wrong thing

The most valuable output of an assessment is frequently a decision not to spend. Roughly one in five of ours concludes that the client should not proceed, and we put that in writing.

OUTCOME 02

Programmes survive their first year

Sequencing value early keeps political support alive. Most transformation failures are not technical — they are budget withdrawals that follow eighteen months without a visible result.

OUTCOME 03

Investment decisions get defensible evidence

Boards and investors act faster on independent technical diligence with risk ratings than on internal advocacy, particularly where an acquisition or a large build is at stake.

What You Receive

What lands on the table at the end.

  • A written value model with metrics, baselines, targets and named owners
  • A ranked opportunity list with estimated value and effort per item
  • An explicit list of what we recommend not doing, and why
  • Architecture and data findings with risk ratings
  • A sequenced, costed roadmap where each phase funds the next
  • A working session with your leadership team to agree the decisions
Technology & Method

The engineering underneath.

Proof

Numbers from work already in production.

Measured against the baseline agreed with the client before the engagement started.

1 in 5

Assessments say stop

Written recommendations not to proceed

2 wks

To a written verdict

Standard value assessment

100%

Fee credited

Against any subsequent delivery engagement

Questions

What executives ask before engaging.

  • 01. Are you objective if you also want the delivery work?
    It is a fair challenge. Our answer is the record: about a fifth of our assessments recommend not proceeding, and we regularly recommend products over our own build. The assessment fee is credited either way, so we are not funded by talking you into a project.
  • 02. Who actually does the work?
    Senior engineers and practice leads who deliver. You will not be assigned a research analyst who has never operated the kind of system being discussed.
  • 03. Can you review work another firm is doing?
    Yes. Independent review of an in-flight programme is one of our most requested engagements, and we deliver findings to you rather than negotiating them with the incumbent first.
  • 04. What if we disagree with your recommendation?
    You keep the document and the reasoning, and you are free to proceed differently. We would rather be overruled with the evidence on the table than agree to a plan we think will fail.
Related

Where to go next.

01 / 03

Business Value

Why every engagement starts at your value model.

Continue reading
02 / 03

ROI Model

How we price against outcomes.

Continue reading
03 / 03

Business Transformation

From pilot to operating model.

Continue reading
Next Step

Two weeks, one written verdict, and a fee you get back.

The value assessment produces a value model, a ranked opportunity list and an honest recommendation — credited in full against any delivery that follows.