A common worry before starting is that months will go by with a lot of discussion and nothing working. That is a fair worry and it is avoidable.
Weeks one and two: find the leaks
Not designing anything. Establishing what is actually happening.
- How inquiries arrive, through which channels, and what happens to each.
- Where things currently fall over, according to the people doing the work.
- What is already measured and what is not.
- What tools exist, what they are used for, and what is duplicated.
- What the owner spends time on that somebody else could.
The output is a short list of the largest leaks, ranked by what they are worth rather than by how interesting they are.
Weeks three to six: fix the biggest one
One thing, properly, end to end. Not a platform. Not a roadmap. One leak closed and working.
That is deliberate. It produces something real quickly, it proves the approach on a small scale, and it earns the right to do more. It also frequently changes the priorities for everything after it, because doing one thing properly reveals what is actually going on.
Weeks six to ten: the next two or three
With one thing working and the team's confidence earned, the pace goes up. Each addition is scoped the same way: a specific leak, a specific fix, measured.
By this point there should also be basic reporting in place, because otherwise nobody can tell whether any of it is working.
Weeks ten to thirteen: hand over and measure
- The team using it without help.
- Documentation that somebody new could follow.
- Numbers showing what changed, compared against where things started.
- A short list of what is worth doing next, with honest sizing.
What should be true at ninety days
Something measurable has improved, the team is using it voluntarily, and the business is not dependent on the person who built it. If none of those are true at three months, something has gone wrong with the approach.
What should not happen
A three-month discovery phase. A platform decision made before the problems are understood. A tool bought in week one. Any of those are signs the engagement is being run backwards.