Tried AI and seen little return? Ready to start again, but want to be clear about outcomes? We help companies find the AI opportunities worth backing.
A partner, not a vendor
A vendor finds the problems it can fix. We find the ones worth fixing. Objectivity is the point.
Broad or focused
We offer opportunity mapping of the whole business, or a deep dive on one idea you already have.
A clear decision
Go or no-go for ideas, with the business case, requirements and risks, delivered at speed.
The Problem we see
When you're starting out in AI, there's no shortage of ideas or places to begin. Many ideas come from the loudest voice in the room, a vendor demo, a new market trend, a competitor's AI announcement, or a board that simply says "we need to do AI".
If you're further along, you've probably been through this already: the tool roll-outs, the pilot launches, the demos with fanfare, and the individual heroics. There may be some clear wins, but the wider business hasn't moved and sustainable return is hard to show.
Every project that goes nowhere uses the same people, the same budget and the same attention that could have gone to the right one. You need a fast and efficient way of identifying the AI opportunities that are going to move the needle for your organisation.
That's where we help.
How we help
Bring us one idea or many. We test each against your strategy, processes, capabilities and outcomes, and narrow them to the one or two worth backing. Our only job is to find out what is worth doing, what isn't, and whether AI is part of the answer, before you invest in building anything.
Where we look
Where could AI create more value for your customers?
New products and services that AI makes possible, or worth building for the first time.
New ways to charge, built around the outcomes customers get, not just access.
Turning what you know about your market and customers into something they value.
Getting customers to results from what they've bought, sooner.
Knowing what each customer needs next, and serving them more personally.
Where is effort going into work that shouldn't exist?
Customer support: which tickets never need a person, and which need a better-equipped one.
Sales and customer success: account research, proposals, renewal risk and deal admin.
Finance, back office and compliance work still done by hand.
The spreadsheets and workarounds quietly holding the business together.
Technology delivery: how product gets decided, built, tested and run.
How we assess each idea
Every idea is mapped against what your organisation would need to really make it work.
Value
What the opportunity is worth, to whom, costs, and how soon it pays back.
Capability
The skills, data and technology it needs, and whether you have them today.
Governance
Ownership, risk, security and compliance, and who signs it off.
Readiness
How it fits the way you work now, and what would have to change around it.
The Process
We bring expertise in innovation management, strategy, service design, operational efficiency and technology delivery, and an outside-in view that traces every idea through the whole system. Five steps take you from where to play to a decision you can act on, and weak ideas drop out early.
Scope and pre-research
We agree with you the areas to explore and run a quick analysis to see where the opportunities are. Where they aren't obvious yet, we do early research to find them.
Kick-off workshop
A working session with your key stakeholders to challenge the strategy, define what success looks like, brainstorm the opportunities and agree the mapping criteria.
Multi-method research
Interviews, desk research and your own data. We build out each case, uncover the knowledge that sits with your teams, and look for the surprises that show how good an idea really is and how well it's understood.
Synthesis workshop
We bring everything we've found back into the room and work through the ideas with your people, ending in a go or no-go on each and the use cases to take forward.
After the workshop
For the ideas you back, we write up the business case and a requirements document, ready to take to your own team, a builder or a partner.
Four to six weeks from kick-off to findings.
Light touch for your team: a point person, time with the idea owners, and two key working sessions.
What you come away with
Not a wish list. A small number of opportunities, each with our best estimate of the value it would deliver and a clear next step.
Output 01
Your leaders agreed on where you want to play, and which opportunities matter there.
Output 02
Where AI could create or realise value across the business, and where it can't.
Output 03
Each idea assessed on value, capability, governance and readiness, so you can compare like for like.
Output 04
Including the ones to stop, and why. Knowing what not to do is often the biggest saving.
Output 05
Value, risk and readiness, and the full cost: not just the build, but running, monitoring and maintaining it.
Output 06
For the ideas you back: what each needs to work, what could go wrong, and what to ask a builder or partner for.
What we've learned
When we look across the business, the same things tend to hold AI back. Each one is also where the opportunity is.
We found the first ideas on the table nearly always make today's process faster. The bigger value was usually in changing the work, or stopping it.
→ Now we ask whether the work should exist before we ask what AI could do to it.
We found plenty of teams with demos and pilots running, and very few with a business case behind them.
→ Now every idea gets a goal, an outcome and a value before anyone commits to it.
We found the list leadership gave us and the real opportunities rarely matched. The rework, handoffs and workarounds sat with the teams.
→ Now we spend most of our time with the people closest to the work.
We found that running, monitoring and maintaining an AI system can cost more over its life than building it, and it was rarely in the first business case.
→ Now we keep the whole life of an idea in view, including what it takes to run, not just the build.
The questions leadership teams usually ask us first. If yours isn't here, bring it to the call.
Still have questions? Talk to us →No. We find and test the ideas, then hand over to your own team or a builder you choose. Having nothing to sell afterwards is what keeps our advice objective.
Yes. We start with what you tried and why it didn't land, then decide what's worth another go and what should stop.
Then we'll tell you. Some of the most useful findings are problems better solved by changing a process, fixing data or using a simpler tool. A clear no-go saves you finding out the expensive way.
Yes. If you already know the problem you want to solve, we can do a focused deep dive on that one issue instead of looking across the whole business. You get the same go or no-go, business case and requirements, in less time.
Usually four to six weeks. We need a senior sponsor, time with the people who know the work, and access to the data you already have. Most of the effort is ours.
A fixed fee, agreed after a short scoping conversation, so you know the full cost before we start. The price depends on how widely we look and how many ideas we take through to a business case.
You have a go or no-go on every idea, plus business cases and a requirements document for the ones you back. Take them to your own team or a builder. You're not tied to us.
Whether AI hasn't paid off yet or you're about to start, talk to us about where you are and what you want to achieve. We'll let you know if we can help.
