The audit is designed so that its first recommendation can be ‘not us’. It has been, nineteen times. Here are three, because a firm that only publishes the engagements it won has published a sales page.
The energy company that wanted three programmes
After a maintenance redesign had gone well, the board wanted to repeat it everywhere at once. The audit priced all three and argued against two: one because the sensor data could not carry it, one because a rota change achieved most of the benefit for none of the cost. €4.1m of maintenance capacity came back from the one that survived. The rota change was implemented by the client in a month.
The retailer that wanted a forecasting model
Stock-outs were the symptom. The audit found the replenishment rule was fine and the supplier’s lead time was quoted in working days while the system assumed calendar days. One conversation with the supplier. No model.
The lender that wanted a data platform
Two reports disagreed. The proposed fix was a lake. The audit found the two reports defined ‘customer’ differently and had done since a 2017 migration. One definition, one owner, eight weeks of foundations. No lake.
19 of 64
audits whose first recommendation was something we do not sell
How it was measured
Eleven of the nineteen later bought a second engagement. Eight did not, and were right not to.
The audit costs a fixed fee and four weeks. If it saves a board a programme it did not need, it was the best money in the year; if it finds one it does, the roadmap prices it. Either way the recommendation was written before anybody at Tessel knew whether it would lead to more work, which is the only reason it means anything.