Talent, Enablement & AdvisoryAI Strategy, Governance & Compliance
AI Opportunity & Roadmap Sprint
A board-ready AI roadmap for the whole business: opportunities across functions prioritised, the top ones costed with ROI models, a build, buy or do-not-do call on each, and a governance and risk read, so leadership can decide what to fund and in what order.
AI Opportunity & Roadmap Sprint
$18K–$30K
- Duration: 2–3 weeks
- Tier: Diagnose
- Format: Fixed scope
You leave withCosted, prioritised AI roadmap with ROI model, board-ready
Book a Free SessionSound familiar?
The board keeps asking what our AI plan is. Every function has its own ideas and vendors are in every week, but nothing is prioritised and nobody has costed anything. I cannot tell which ideas are real and which are demos. I need one plan I can put in front of the board and defend to the CFO, including what we should not do and what could go wrong.
What you leave with
Long list and scoring criteria
Format: Workbook
How we know it’s acceptableCriteria signed by the sponsor at the start. Every item scored with a one-line reason.
Roadmap
Format: Two-page visual, also in the board paper
How we know it’s acceptableEach initiative has a horizon, dependencies, a proposed owner and a build, buy or do-not-do call.
ROI workbook
Format: Spreadsheet
How we know it’s acceptableEvery input labelled client-confirmed or estimated. Finance has reviewed the baselines. Sensitivity shown.
Board paper, readout and first-phase scope
Format: PDF of up to ten pages, live readout, one-page priced scope
How we know it’s acceptableThe sponsor confirms it can go to the board without us in the room. Includes the governance read and a fixed-fee first phase.
Also included
- A governance and risk read per initiative: the data it uses, who has to approve it, which regulation touches it, and the readiness gaps. This is not a legal opinion.
How it runs
2–3 weeks
Week 1
Frame and discover
Agree the objective, audience and criteria. Run the interviews and collect baselines.
OutThe long list and a one-page set of criteria the sponsor has signed.
Week 2
Score and model
Score the long list, build the ROI models, draft the governance read. Gate: a sponsor checkpoint where priorities that functions dispute are decided.
OutPrioritised list, draft models and risk read.
Week 3
Roadmap and board paper
OutFinal roadmap, ROI workbook, board paper, readout and the first-phase scope.
Two-week variant: only with three or fewer functions and baselines already in hand. Interviews run on days 1 to 3 and weeks 2 and 3 merge. Effort is re-estimated, not compressed.
Is this right for you?
This is for you if
- Buyerthe leader who has to answer the board’s question about AI: a COO, or head of strategy or transformation, sometimes a CTO.
- Also has to say yesFinance, because the ROI model has to survive a CFO. The heads of the functions we interview, who can quietly stall a roadmap they were not consulted on. IT or security, for data access and for the governance read. If it is going to the board, the board sponsor. Most lost deals here are lost to a function head who was never in the room.
This is the wrong answer if
- The client already knows what they want. A named workflow is the Agent Opportunity Blueprint. A defined feature is the AI Feature Sprint. This sprint is for when the question is where to start.
- We cannot get the people or the numbers. If function heads will not give interview time and Finance will not share baselines, the ROI model becomes assumption stacking and ‘board-ready’ is not honest.
- They want a vendor or technology selection, or an architecture decision. That is not what this produces.
- They want a legal, regulatory or compliance opinion. The governance read is a readiness view, not an opinion, and nobody here is signing one.
- The company is small or the question sits in one function. The Possibilities Session or the Agent Opportunity Blueprint is enough. This is built for several functions.
What’s included, and what isn’t
In scope
- up to six functions
- up to twelve interviews of 45 minutes
- review of documents the client supplies
- one criteria workshop
- scoring, roadmap and ROI models for the top five to eight
- the governance and risk read
- a board paper
- one leadership readout
- a priced first-phase scope
- one round of revisions
Out of scope
- building or prototyping anything
- architecture or vendor selection
- any legal, regulatory or compliance opinion, audit or certification
- writing the client’s AI policies
- data audits or cleanup
- change management or organisation design
- a second round of revisions
Before we start
Before day one
- A named executive sponsor who is available.
- The audience and the date the roadmap is for.
- The interview list agreed, with time held in diaries.
- A Finance contact with access to baseline data.
- A list of existing AI initiatives and vendors.
- Documents shared under confidentiality terms.
- Agreement in writing that the governance read is not a legal opinion.
What we’ll need from your team
- The sponsor: one hour a week and a one-hour checkpoint in week 2.
- Each interviewee: 45 minutes, plus a short review of what we recorded.
- Finance: two to three hours across the engagement.
- IT or security lead: one to two hours.
- Readout attendees: one hour.
Pricing
What we need to give you a quote
- Company size and the functions in scope.
- The sponsor, the audience and the date.
- A list of AI initiatives and vendor commitments already in place.
- What financial and operational baselines are available.
- The regulatory environment.
- Security constraints on sharing data.
- Executive interview availability.
After we hand over
What we measure
- Sprints delivered
- Share that become a paid first phase within six months, and which programme
- Share where the roadmap was presented to the board
The client measures: the operating and financial baselines inside the models, and what the board decided. Ask in the final readout whether it went to the board and what happened.
What comes next
- The first phase of the roadmapwhich in practice means AI Feature Sprint, Document Intelligence Sprint or Agent Prototype Sprint depending on the top initiative.
- Agent Opportunity Blueprintwhere the top initiatives are agent workflows that need detail.
- SDLC AI Maturity Audit or Inference Cost Teardownwhere the roadmap points at software delivery or inference spend.
- AI Engineering Pod — Standardwhere the roadmap is large and the client has no team to run it.
- Nothing yet.If the roadmap says the client is not ready, that is the finding.
Questions buyers ask us
They can. Ours is fixed price, 2 to 3 weeks, and ends with a scoped and priced first phase. Ask them for the same terms.
This is a fair objection. Every roadmap must include at least one ‘do not do’ and, where one exists, a ‘buy, do not build’. The roadmap is yours and any vendor can use it.
Only as credible as the baselines. We label every input and show what has to be true for the return to hold. Where Finance does not have the number, we write ‘not known’ and do not invent it.
Bring it. We score it and interview for what is missing. If the list is already scored and costed, you do not need this and we will say so.
We deliver a readiness read, not a legal opinion, and we name who on your side or which adviser has to sign off.