The scoping step that makes the retainer work.
Every retainer is scoped on a Diagnostic. 4-8 interviews across your team, a map of how work actually moves between people, quantified findings, and a sequenced roadmap for the skills I'll build on the retainer. Claude Code set up on your office machine during the same engagement.
AU$4,000–$7,000 · 2-3 weeks · fixed quoteStep 4 of the engagement. Required, not optional.
The five steps are Research, Discovery, free Assessment, Diagnostic, Retainer. Each one earns the next. The Diagnostic sits between the Assessment readout and a retainer commitment. It scopes what the retainer should build.
Why it is required. The retainer builds skills that automate workflows across people and departments. Skill build order depends on how work actually crosses team boundaries. Without mapping that first, I would be guessing at sequence and dependencies. Two to three weeks of scoping up front saves months of rework.
What I will not do. I will not quote a retainer off a single conversation or an Assessment alone. The Assessment reveals where time is going. The Diagnostic reveals how to build the fix. The two do different jobs.
What you get.
Workflow Maps
Visual maps of how work actually flows through your business. Not how you think it works. How it actually works. Who touches what, in what order, and where things stall.
Bottleneck Analysis
The specific points where work gets stuck, delayed, or duplicated. Named, measured, and ranked by impact. No vague "communication could be improved". Concrete findings.
Time & Cost Quantification
Dollar figures on what each bottleneck is costing you. Hours per week, cost per year, recovery potential. So you can make decisions based on numbers, not gut feel.
Prioritised Recommendations
What to fix first, second, third. Each recommendation ranked by effort vs. impact. Some are quick wins you can do tomorrow. Others need investment but deliver the biggest returns.
Implementation Roadmap
A sequenced plan for the next 6-12 months. What to eliminate, what to restructure, what to automate, and in what order so you're not trying to change everything at once.
Claude Code Setup
Claude Code installed on your office machine during the Diagnostic. Configured with your business context, approval gates on real-world actions, and MCP connections to Xero, Gmail, Calendar, and Drive. Ready to use on Day 1 of the retainer.
Who this is for.
Business owners who have completed the free Assessment and are ready to commit to a retainer. Typically 15-200 employees, AU$5-50M revenue. The team is busy, but output doesn't match the effort. Things fall through cracks. Handoffs take too long. People are doing work that shouldn't exist.
Not a fit: Anyone looking for a generic "digital transformation" roadmap, a slide-ware AI strategy, or a developer to build a spec they have already written. I don't do those. If the Assessment reveals we're not a fit for a retainer, we part friends before the Diagnostic.
How the diagnostic works.
Discovery Interviews
I talk to 4-8 people across your business. Owners, managers, and the people doing the actual work. Not surveys. Real conversations about how their day works, what frustrates them, and where they lose time.
Workflow Mapping
I map how work actually moves from person to person and system to system. Every handoff, every decision point, every approval chain. The real process, not the one in your policy manual.
Analysis & Findings
I quantify what I found. Hours lost per week, dollars per year, root causes behind the symptoms. I cross-reference what different people told me to separate perception from reality.
Recommendations Presentation
I present findings to your leadership team in person or on a call. Written report with workflow maps, cost analysis, and a prioritised roadmap. You walk away knowing exactly what to fix, in what order, and why.
Claude Code Setup
Before the Diagnostic closes, I install Claude Code on your office machine, wire up MCP connections to Xero, Gmail, Calendar, and Drive, and configure approval gates on any action that sends, pays, or commits. When the retainer starts on Day 1, the tooling is already running.
What it costs and what it returns.
The Diagnostic: AU$4,000–$7,000. The range depends on business complexity. A 20-person company with two departments is less work than a 150-person company with five. I quote a fixed price after the scoping conversation.
What's included: All interviews, workflow mapping, analysis, the written report, the presentation, and Claude Code setup on your office machine. No hidden fees. No "phase two" upsell baked into the scope. You own the findings.
Typical return: Quick wins alone (the changes that cost nothing to implement) typically recover AU$15,000–$30,000 per year in staff capacity. That is before any automation investment on the retainer.
The retainer that follows: Monthly engagement starting from AU$1,500/month, month-to-month, no minimum term. I build the skills identified in the Diagnostic directly on your Claude Code setup, and the retainer includes two hours of AI training per month for you and your team, so skills transfer as we build.