How it runs

Five weeks, and what you have at the end of them.

The sequence is the same whatever sector you are in — it is the method, not the industry. What changes is what gets read in week two, and that comes from your own page.

This is written down once, here, rather than repeated on twenty-five proposals. A proposal should tell you what we would look for in your operation and what it costs; it should not spend half its length explaining a process that does not vary.

The sequence

Five weeks for one operating unit. More units run in parallel rather than in series, so a group does not take five times as long.

Week 1
Intake and reconciliationYou complete the intake in the client portal — a set of requests written for your sector, alongside the 107 that cover the operating spine any business has. Anything you do not have is skipped in one click, with a reason. We reconcile what arrives against what was asked and tell you, before any fieldwork, which findings the gaps will limit.
Weeks 2–3
Full pass, not a sampleEvery record in scope is read rather than sampled. Concentrated loss is exactly what sampling misses — one contract, one queue, one unreviewed account — so a sample of the operation tends to miss it and a full pass tends to find it.
Week 4
Quantification and challengeEach finding is sized, and each is put to the person who owns it before it is written down. A finding the operator can immediately explain away is not a finding, and it is cheaper to discover that here than in the room.
Week 5
Report and walkthroughA written report with the evidence attached, and a walkthrough with whoever you want in the room. Findings are ranked by annual value and by how hard they are to act on, because those are different axes and the cheap ones should not wait for the big ones.

What you get

A written report, with the evidence for each finding attached rather than referenced.
Each finding sized in annual value, and ranked against how hard it is to act on.
The reconciliation of what was asked for against what was provided, so the limits of the work are stated rather than implied.
A walkthrough with whoever you want present.
Your documents destroyed on completion, with a certificate naming every file.

What happens to what we find

A proper look at how an operation really runs will turn things up — that is what you are paying for, and it is also why commissioning one takes a little nerve. Whatever we find concerns people you hired, trusted, and in some cases have known for twenty years. So here is exactly what happens to it, because you should know that before you decide rather than after.

First — it comes to you, and stops there. Findings go to you and to nobody else. You decide what circulates, to whom, and when. Nothing arrives in a board pack, a department head’s inbox or anybody’s personnel file because we put it there.
Mostly — almost none of it is anyone’s fault. Standard costs drift. Contracts outlive the person who negotiated them. Nobody decided to stop enforcing that clause — the person who used to watch it left in 2021 and it was in nobody’s job description after that. Concentrated loss is what busy, well-run operations produce. Looking for it is not an accusation.
If not — anything uncomfortable is a conversation first. If something turns up that is not drift, you hear it from us spoken, early and in private, before it is written down anywhere. What happens next is your call, on your timing, with your own counsel.
Never — we read systems, not people. An operating review is not a forensic investigation, and we do not quietly run one inside the other. We establish where the money goes, not who to blame for it. If a finding points somewhere that needs different expertise and different rules, we say so and stop.

The examination happens either way. A buyer’s diligence team, a lender at renewal, a regulator, an insurer after a claim, a departing partner’s counsel — each of those reads your operation eventually, on their timetable, in front of their audience, with you having no say over what happens next. This is the version where you go first, in private, and you decide.

Terms we work to on every engagement

The client is the only party paying us. Our conclusion has no second sponsor.

We will price phase one before discussing phase two, say when someone else should fix a finding, sign your NDA on request, and leave you every file, document and model.
We will not take vendor commissions or referral fees, resell software we are paid to place, inflate findings to sell phase two, or interrupt customers, front-line staff or revenue work.

The commercial half is written down too — when an order becomes binding, what cancellation costs, who owns the deliverables and how regulated data is handled are all in the ordering terms. An order is an offer to purchase; it binds no one until we accept it in writing naming the scope, the fee and the start date.

What we need from you

The intake is completed in the client portal, which saves each answer as it is given and can be returned to as often as you like. Anything you do not have can be skipped with a reason — skipping narrows what the review can conclude, and we tell you where before the work starts rather than after.

The sector-specific half of the intake is listed on each industry page, so you can see exactly what would be asked before you commission anything.

Purchase order is the primary route.

Most buyers this size raise a PO and pay against an invoice on terms. Card and bank transfer exist for those who prefer them. Prices, deposits and the purchase-order form are all on the ordering page, and the commercial terms are in the ordering terms.

Start with your own sector

Each industry page names what recurs there, in the words that sector uses, and the proposal behind it carries the price for your number of operating units.