Lesson 1 · 14 min
The consultant who disappears within a year almost never fails for lack of technical skill. They hear the request, deliver exactly what was requested, and the request was wrong from the start. Building got easy; what a company buys is someone who diagnoses first.
Start the lesson
Goal: separate what the client asks for from what they need, and present yourself as someone who diagnoses, not someone who builds.
The request never arrives ready. Your job is the middle block.
Building can be part of implementation. What the company pays for, at all three levels, is the right decision.
Click on each one. They fit in ten minutes of conversation.
Ask someone to describe a process from start to finish. If no one can, automating it is building on sand.
A company with no documented process doesn't get better with AI: it just gets faster at making mistakes.
Walk me through, step by step, what happens from the moment an order comes in until it's delivered.
Database, loose spreadsheets, or in three people's heads? Ask whether there is a document that explains what each field means.
Having that document is a rare sign of maturity.
If I need a client's history, where do I look first?
Hired by a manager without leadership's sign-off, you are a foreign body in the company.
Projects like this die at the first budget cut, no matter how good the work is.
Who else needs to approve this for it to become a company standard?
A company that has never connected two systems is at a different stage.
This doesn't stop the project, but it changes the timeline, the price, and how much training you include.
Failed two or more checkpoints? Don't sell implementation. Sell preparation.
The top step is not the most profitable one.
You build the automations or guide the people who build them. Building is part of the service, not the whole service.
Pair it with a small monthly advisory so you stay close after delivery.
You organize process, data, and owners before any technology.
It has less competition and less technical risk, and it's easier to get approved inside the company. Almost no one offers it under its own name.
Hands-on workshops with the tools the company already pays for.
It's the cheapest way in and the one that generates the most work afterward. Lesson 8 shows how to set up the workshop.
Replace the text between < > with your own. Use it in an AI assistant of your choice.
I help <type of company> <result as a number or decision> starting with a <timeframe> diagnostic. I don't <what you don't do: e.g. sell tools before the diagnostic, run campaigns, program legacy systems>.
You are an experienced AI consultant. I am going to assess a company's readiness before proposing any automation. Company: <industry and what it sells> Size: <approximate number of employees> Area that contacted me: <area or job title> Generate a diagnostic questionnaire with 4 blocks: processes, data, leadership support, and systems. For each block: - 3 open questions, in the language of someone who works in that industry - what a GOOD answer looks like - what a BAD answer looks like - the practical consequence of each bad answer for the project At the end, write the sentence I use to say "you're not ready yet" without offending anyone.
This is the description of my AI consulting service: """<paste here how you describe yourself today>""" Do three things, in this order: 1. Rewrite my description the way a skeptical buyer understands it. 2. List 5 hard questions a board would ask that my description doesn't answer. 3. Propose 3 new versions: one focused on readiness, one on cost reduction, one on risk. Maximum 2 sentences each. Don't compliment me. Point out where it's vague.
Do this before moving on to lesson 2.
Fill in the two-line template. Run the "test your positioning" prompt and rewrite until the 5 hard questions have answers.
Done when: the statement has 2 lines, doesn't mention any tool, and the second line says what you do not do.
Answer in writing: of your last 3 clients (or conversations), how many had a documented process? Could the person who signed renew on their own? Do you have a preparation offer with a name, scope, and price?
Done when: the 3 answers are written down and your preparation offer has a name and a one-line scope.
4 questions. The explanation appears after your attempt.
Question 1 of 4
A company failed the process and data checkpoints. What do you sell?
Question 2 of 4
What does your positioning statement need to have?
Question 3 of 4
The client asks for "an agent." What is usually the right answer?
Question 4 of 4
You were hired by a manager the board doesn't know. What trap is this?
Pick an answer. The explanation shows up after you try.