For the technology decisions that are too big to make on a support call
Architecture, infrastructure and technology strategy for organisations that need a straight answer before they commit budget. We look at what you actually have, tell you what we would change and what we would leave alone, and give you something you can take to a board.
No product to sell you at the end of it. If the honest answer is that your current setup is fine, that is the answer you get.
- ISO 27001 information security
- ISO 9001 quality management
- Cyber Essentials Plus
- Enterprise and public sector delivery
- Leeds based, national reach
Usually it is a decision nobody wants to own
The call rarely starts with a technology question. It starts with a decision that has been sitting on the agenda for three meetings.
- A contract or platform is up for renewal. Nobody is sure whether to renew, replace or renegotiate.
- Cloud spend has grown. Nobody can explain the shape of it well enough to fix it.
- An acquisition or restructure. Two estates that were never designed to work together.
- A system is holding the business back. Replacing it looks too risky to start, so nobody starts.
- An audit, tender or client questionnaire. It has asked something the current architecture cannot answer.
- An internal team is stretched. It needs a second opinion from someone with no stake in the outcome.
Six areas, taken separately or together
Open the ones that match the decision in front of you. Most engagements draw on two or three of these at once.
- Technology strategy and roadmapA sequence finance can plan aroundWhere the estate is now, where the business needs it to be, and a sequence to get there that finance can plan around.
- Solution and enterprise architectureWhat breaks if you move a pieceTarget architecture, integration design and the dependency map that tells you what breaks if you move a piece.
- Infrastructure and networksThe resilience questions, asked earlyServer, storage, network and connectivity design, including the resilience questions that only get asked after an outage.
- Cloud and migration planningMove, leave or retire, with the running costWhat to move, what to leave, what to retire, and an honest view of what it will cost to run once it is there.
- Security architectureMapped to the standards you get asked aboutAccess, identity, segmentation and control design, mapped to the standards your auditors and clients actually ask about.
- Vendor and cost reviewWhat you pay for versus what you useWhat you are paying for, what you are using, and where a contract is quietly costing more than the thing it replaced.
Fixed scope, so you know what you are buying
Every engagement is scoped and priced before it starts, so you know what you are buying and what you will have at the end of it.
- 01
Scope the question
A short conversation to work out what decision you are actually trying to make, and whether we are the right people to help with it. - 02
Look at what exists
Systems, contracts, architecture, costs and the constraints nobody writes down. We talk to the people who run it day to day, not just the org chart. - 03
Test the options
Realistic routes with what each one costs, what it risks and what it rules out later. Including the option of doing nothing. - 04
Write it up plainly
A recommendation with the reasoning visible, so somebody who was not in the room can follow it and challenge it. - 05
Stay available
Questions come up when the work starts. We would rather answer them than hand over a document and disappear.
Something you can act on, not a deck
Tailored to the engagement, but typically some combination of:
- Current state assessment of the estate, with the risks ranked rather than just listed
- Target architecture and integration design
- Dependency and impact map
- Options appraisal with cost, risk and timeline for each route
- Prioritised roadmap with a sensible sequence
- Cost model, including what it costs to run once built
- Security and control design mapped to the relevant standards
- A written recommendation your board can read without a translator
We run estates as well as advise on them
- We have to live with our own recommendationsWe run managed services for organisations like yours, so we know which designs are pleasant on paper and painful at two in the morning.
- No product to pushIf the honest answer is to renew what you have and fix two things, that is what the report says. You can hand the delivery to us or to someone else, and the recommendation stands either way.
- We talk to the people who actually run itThe constraints that matter are rarely in the documentation. They are in the heads of the people who keep the thing going.
- Enterprise and public sector workISO 27001, ISO 9001 and Cyber Essentials Plus behind the work, and the audit trail that comes with them.
- The AI side is in the same buildingWhere intelligence or automation would genuinely change the answer, we can say so and show you what that route looks like.
- Bring us the decision that keeps getting deferredIf it has been on the agenda for three meetings, it is ready for an outside view. Scope, price and timescale are agreed before anything starts.Book a free consultation
Bring us the decision that keeps getting deferred
One conversation, no obligation. We will tell you whether it is a consulting job, a support job, or something you can sort out yourselves in an afternoon.
Related: Managed IT Services for running the estate day to day, and AI Transformation Advisory where the question is about AI rather than infrastructure.
