Independent digital consulting with no build attached to the answer

The written output is a prioritised list, with each item carrying an estimate of what it costs you now and a rough sense of the effort to address it. That framing matters because the technically worst problem is frequently not the most commercially urgent one, and a list sorted by engineering distaste helps nobody. We deliberately include the items where the right answer is to do nothing, because knowing which problems to tolerate is as valuable as knowing which to fix.

• The systems in use, what each costs, and which ones overlap in function
• Where staff work around software with spreadsheets, email or rekeying
• Data flows between systems, and the points where truth diverges
• The customer facing experience, from first search through to service delivery
• Security posture, backups and where personal information sits
• Key person risk and undocumented processes nobody else can perform
• Contracts, renewal dates and where you are locked in

We build them in horizons. The near term contains work that pays back inside a year and needs no organisational change, which is often automation of a manual process or fixing an integration. The middle contains the things that require a decision and a real budget line. The far horizon is deliberately vague, described as directions rather than projects, because pretending to know what you will build in three years is a way of committing to assumptions that have not been tested. Each item carries the question it depends on, so when circumstances change you can see immediately which parts of the plan are affected. Commonly the first horizon turns out to be removing manual handling rather than any new system at all.

A fractional arrangement puts someone in that seat for an agreed amount of time each month. In practice it is reviewing proposals and quotes before you sign, sitting in on vendor conversations so the technical claims get tested, sanity checking what your existing developers or agency are telling you, being available when something urgent needs a judgement call, and providing a written view for the board when required. It is deliberately advisory. We do not manage your suppliers or take operational responsibility for delivery, because that turns into a shadow management layer that muddies accountability. Organisations in manufacturing and similar sectors often use this while a larger system replacement is under consideration, since the cost of getting that decision wrong dwarfs the advisory fee.

We also decline work where the real requirement is a document supporting a decision already made. Be wary too of an audit offered as a lead generation device: if a firm provides one at no cost, its purpose is to produce a proposal. Where you already know the problem is specific and technical, go directly to the specialist work instead. That might be a security assessment if the question is exposure, an architecture review if it is cost and scale, or a scoping conversation about building the thing if the case is already made. For organisations with an internal technology function, we are usually most useful as a second opinion on one decision rather than a broad review, a shape that suits enterprise clients.