01
The engineer in the scoping call is the engineer building it
No partner-pitches-junior-delivers. We deliberately stay small enough that the senior who scopes also types.
Principles
Four non-negotiables.
We've turned down work that wouldn't fit. These are the principles we won't compromise on - they're how we stay good at our job.
02
Price by outcome, not by the hour
Fixed scope, fixed fee. We absorb the risk of scoping cleanly. If we overrun, that's on us - not you.
03
Code in your repos. IP yours from day one.
We don't operate an AssurePath sandbox you migrate from later. Your GitHub, your access. Full IP transfer is standard, never billed.
04
Ship in weeks, not quarters
If we can't ship the first working version inside 30 days, we redraw the scope. A 90-day discovery is a 90-day delay.
The five steps
From scope to live in five honest steps.
The same shape whether you're scoping a 6-week AI Pilot at £18k, a £60k workflow rollout, or a £150k+ programme. The blocks scale; the shape stays the same.
01
Scope
Week 1
02
Blueprint
Week 1–2
03
Build
Week 2–6
04
Land
Week 6–8
05
Run
Ongoing
01 · WEEK 1Scope
A working session. Not a pitch.
A 90-minute session with a senior engineer and a strategist. You bring the constraint - what's eating your team, what isn't shipping, what the auditor flagged. We bring questions, an opinion, and a rough idea of whether it's a six-week piece of work or a six-month one. By the end of week one you have a fixed scope, a fixed price, and an architecture sketch sitting in your inbox.
Scope documentFixed-fee proposalArchitecture sketchRisk register
02 · WEEK 1–2Blueprint
Architecture, decisions, dependencies.
The doc your future self will thank us for. Where the new thing sits, what it integrates with, what gets refactored on the way, and who owns each piece after we leave. Reviewed with your team - and revised - before a line of code is written. Security review and data-flow diagrams included.
Technical blueprintDecision logIntegration mapSecurity review
03 · WEEK 2–6Build
We build the thing. In your repo. With your team in the room.
Code lives in your GitHub / GitLab / Azure DevOps from day one. Twice-weekly demos with whoever you bring. Direct Slack or Teams channel with the engineers. Production-grade from the first commit - no "we'll harden it later". CI/CD pipelines, evals, test coverage. No black-box handover at the end because there's no black box to begin with.
Working software in stagingCI/CD pipelinesTest coverage & evalsTwice-weekly demos
04 · WEEK 6–8Land
Training, runbooks, phased rollout. The bit other firms skip.
We train the team that's going to use the thing. We write the runbooks the team that's going to operate it will read at 2am. We hold the rollout - not just the cutover. Adoption metrics are baked in from day one so by month three you can prove the ROI in your next board pack.
User training sessionsOperator runbooksPhased rollout planAdoption metrics dashboard
05 · ONGOINGRun
Optional. If you want, we keep it running.
Folded into our Run service - managed IT, cyber operations, cloud. Fixed monthly fee, UK engineers, sub-30-minute response. We carry the on-call rota and the patch tested. If you'd rather operate it yourself, we wave goodbye with a clean handover and a 30-day support tail.
24/7 monitoringFixed-fee SLAQuarterly tech reviewFirst refusal on next build
How it scales
Same five steps. Different sized boxes.
Pilots and programmes share the same DNA. The phases stretch or compress - the rules don't change.
£18k
6 weeks
One workflow, one team. Fastest way to validate value.
Demos1×/wk
First demoDay 5
£25–60k
6–8 weeks
One workflow, one system, or one customer journey.
Demos2×/wk
First demoDay 5
£60–150k
8–10 weeks
Two to four chained workflows, integrated.
Demos2×/wk
First demoDay 5
From £150k
Sequenced
Multi-block programme. Each block fixed-scope, quarterly gates.
DemosWeekly
First demoPer block
Working agreements
How a week actually runs.
The operational things we agree at week one and stick to. No surprise meetings, no surprise invoices, no surprise architecture decisions.
Weekly cadence
Monday 30-min sync, Thursday 45-min demo. That's it - we don't run 6 standups a week.
Direct Slack / Teams
Shared channel with the engineers. We answer in business hours. P1 in <30min, anytime.
Code in your repo
GitHub, GitLab, Azure DevOps, Bitbucket. Day one. Your access, your branch rules, your reviews.
Decisions in writing
Every architecture call goes into a decision log in your wiki. So your team can argue with it later.
Pair, don't hand-over
Your engineers pair with ours during build. By go-live they could keep the thing alive without us.
Security from day one
Threat model, DPA, access audit at week one. Not a checklist tacked on the day before go-live.
Adoption metrics baked in
Baseline measured pre-launch. Live dashboards post-launch. ROI provable in your next board pack.
No scope creep without writing
Change orders priced and signed before any extra hours. Otherwise the price doesn't move.
Who you actually meet
No BDR fronting. Just builders.
Every engagement gets four roles. Three of them on the first call. They're the same people you'll see in the demo, the standup, and the go-live cutover.
El
Engineering lead
FROM SCOPING
Senior engineer. Owns architecture, build and the demo cadence.
S/
Strategist / PM
FROM SCOPING
Maps the outcome, runs the rollout, holds the timeline.
Fe
Fractional exec
IF YOU BRING ONE
CTO, CIO, CISO, DPO or IT Director on retainer. Optional but common.
Oe
Operations engineer
FROM BUILD
Joins for landing + Run handover. The one who'll be on call.
FAQ
What buyers ask about how we work.
Seven questions clients ask in every first call before signing.
A 30-minute working session with a senior engineer and a strategist. You bring the constraint - what's eating your team, what isn't shipping, what the auditor flagged. We bring questions, an opinion, and a rough idea of whether it's a six-week piece of work or a six-month one. No slides. No qualifier soup.