ARTICLES · DUE DILIGENCE, ON US
Read the guides before you commit.
Decision guides and engineering notes on choosing, scoping, building and running AI systems that keep working in your daily operations, long after the launch.
- Read guides to choosing and building useful AI systems.
- Explore the engineering work behind reliable operation.
- Test a proposal before you commit budget or people to it.
Strategy
You Are Approving A Build Nobody Has Checked
The proposal has a number, a timeline and a team who believe in it. Most AI projects are lost in that room, because nobody independent has checked the decision it changes, the data it runs on, or the systems it must plug into.
3 Tests A Vendor Must Pass Before Signing
A proposal that reads well tells you nothing about whether the work will hold up in your environment, because a document cannot fail. 3 tests separate a vendor who can do the work from one who can only describe it.
4 Weeks Day By Day Including What Goes Wrong
A 4-week date for a first release is easy to write down and hard to believe. It becomes believable when you see the shape of the weeks: what exists at the end of each one, and what happens to the date when something goes wrong.
Start With The Call That Can Say No
The first step you take should be the one whose best possible result is that you spend nothing else. Here is what a free first call owes you, when a written plan is worth paying for, and what that written plan has to contain.
When to Buy Delivery and When to Buy Ownership
A fixed-price build insures you against the system not existing; a monthly engagement insures against it existing with nobody responsible. Here is how to tell which failure you face, and what each contract covers.
The Build Versus Buy Math Just Flipped
A software renewal used to have 2 answers: renew, or shop for a cheaper seat. A third, building the workflow yourself, is now cheap enough to price, and pricing both the build and the run changes what the first 2 are worth.
Buy The Commodity, Build Only What Is Yours
Decide which part of a system you need to own before choosing to build, buy or partner. Everything that fails that test is a purchase, an assembly of parts someone else already runs, or something that should not be built.
Which Broken Workflow Should Become Software First
Several workflows need fixing, but only one can go first, and that choice is where the money is usually lost. Test the consequence, access, ownership and readiness of each, then fund the workflow you can write a target for.
Your First Quarter As Chief Operating Officer
A new operations leader has a short window in which to make changes, and less information than anyone who reports to them. Turn the operating review into a focused software priority your team has the capacity to deliver.
The Program Has A Budget And No Builder
An approved transformation program has a sponsor, a steering committee and readouts, and none of them builds anything. When its recommendations need software, identify that work and make someone responsible for it.