One problem. Ninety minutes. A written answer in two days.
You bring the thing that is actually stuck — a roadmap nobody believes, a team that has stopped shipping, a decision you keep deferring. We take it apart properly, and you get it in writing.
The session ends with a recommendation you can act on, including the case against it.
Within two days. Written for the person you have to convince, not just for you.
It is the front door on purpose. If it is not useful you have spent ninety minutes and found out.
Who it is for
- Managers with one specific problem rather than a general sense of unease.
- People about to make an irreversible call — a reorg, a rewrite, a hire, a resignation.
- Anyone considering mentoring or a coaching sprint who wants to test the fit first.
- Also used by companies as a scoping session before a workshop.
The shape of it
- Format
- 90 minutes, remote
- Preparation
- A short written intake
- Output
- A one-page written summary
- Turnaround
- Within two working days
I hold a CTO seat day to day. That is the point: you are not being taught by someone describing a job they left, and the material is drawn from a job I am still doing.
What actually happens
Mostly questions. You bring the thing that is stuck, we take it apart properly, and you get a written page back within two working days.
- The intake
Three questions before we meet: what is happening, what you have tried, and what “solved” looks like. It doubles as a filter — a problem you cannot write down in three answers is usually two problems.
- Ninety minutes
Mostly questions. The value is rarely in what I know; it is in what the questions surface that you already knew.
- The written page
The decision, the options, the trade-off, and what to do first. Sent within two working days.
- Whatever is next, or nothing
Some diagnostics turn into coaching or a workshop. Many are complete on their own, and that is a good outcome.
What you leave with
- A recommendation you can act on this week.
- A one-page written summary, written to be forwarded.
- A clear view of whether the problem you brought was the real one.
- No obligation to buy anything else.
What it costs
€350 including VAT — the number you pay if you are buying this yourself. A flat fee for one person: no minimum, no group to assemble. If the written page is not useful, say so and I will not invoice it.
Partly, yes — and you should. Most of what I teach has been written down well by somebody. If a book solves your problem I would rather tell you which one than sell you an hour; the reading list goes out either way, and it is the cheapest thing I give anybody.
Here is what a book cannot do, and it is the whole of the difference:
- It cannot answer the follow-up. The value is almost never in the principle. It is in the second question — yes, but mine reports to the CFO — and a book has no answer to that because it was written for everyone.
- It has not read your situation. Bring the actual estimate, the actual architecture decision, the actual person who used to be your peer. Generic advice is easy to agree with and almost impossible to apply, which is why so much of it gets read and nothing changes.
- It will not disagree with you. You can finish a book with your original plan intact and a warm feeling of confirmation. That is the failure mode nobody notices. A conversation can push back, and most of the value is in the place where it does.
- It cannot tell you which of three plausible options survives your organisation. Books are good at what holds in general. They are bad at what is true of your company on a Tuesday, and that is usually the decision you are actually stuck on.
- You have already read the book. Most people who arrive here have. The gap is rarely knowledge. It is the confidence to act on it against someone more senior who disagrees.
If the first session tells you the answer was in a book after all, that is a good outcome and a cheap one. I will say so.
Is this the right thing for you?
Thirty minutes. You describe what is going wrong; I tell you which of these actually fits, including when the answer is none of them.