Hiring an AI consultant? Here's every step, before you sign anything.
Fixed scope. Milestones you can see. No surprises in month two.
Start the free workflow diagnostic
Free, about four minutes, and read by Raquel herself.
What are the ten steps?
All ten steps
- 01Free diagnostic
You answer eight questions about one workflow. Raquel sends back a scored one-page read within two business days.
- 02Discovery call
Twenty minutes on the workflow and what you've already tried. You get a straight answer, including "this isn't worth automating."
- 03Scope and proposal
A written scope: what gets built, what doesn't, the price, and the timeline. Discovery-first offers do paid discovery here before the build is quoted.
- 04Contract and deposit
You sign and pay the deposit: 50% for ranged projects, the full amount for flat-priced offers.
- 05Access and kickoff
You grant access to the tools in scope and name the person who approves decisions.
- 06Baseline
Raquel measures how long the workflow takes and how often it goes wrong today, so the result can be checked later.
- 07Build
A contracted technical delivery partner builds to the spec Raquel writes and reviews. Nothing touches your live systems yet.
- 08Testing
The build is tested against failures, duplicates, missing data, permission errors, and timeouts. Raquel reviews the results before you see them.
- 09Acceptance and launch
Your team tries it on real work. It goes live only when your named owner approves it in writing.
- 1030-day review
Thirty days after launch, Raquel measures again against the baseline and walks you through what changed and what to adjust.
Flat-priced offers like the AI policy, vendor selection, and staff training skip the build and testing steps. They follow steps 1 to 5, then delivery and a review.
Who does what?
Who does what, agreed before the contract
Raquel
Diagnosis, scope, measurement, client decisions, and review of every deliverable. You deal with her from the first diagnostic to the 30-day review.
Technical delivery partner
Integration and build work, to the spec Raquel writes. The partner works under contract to Raquel, and you never manage them.
You
A decision owner, system access, someone who actually runs the workflow, and approvals on time.
What quality checks does every project get?
Six checks on every engagement
- Baseline before build
- Testing for failures, duplicates, missing data, permission errors, and timeouts
- Human review on every deliverable
- User acceptance before anything goes live
- Named launch approval
- 30-day post-launch review
What happens if something goes wrong after launch?
Every build ships with a way to switch it off and go back to the manual process. If something breaks inside the 30-day window, you get the fix as part of the project. After that, monitoring and optimization is available from $400 to $1,200 a month.
Questions people ask before hiring an AI consultant
How much of my team's time does this take?
Mostly at the start and the end. Plan on an hour or two at kickoff, time with the person who runs the workflow, and a few hours of testing before launch.
What if the scope changes halfway through?
The change is written up and priced, and you approve it before any work on it starts. Nothing gets added to the bill quietly.
Who owns what gets built?
You do, once the final invoice is paid. The workflows run in your accounts, and you get the documentation at handover.
Do you resell the tools you recommend?
No. Recommendations are based on what fits your workflow, and you pay vendors directly.
Related pages
Step one is free and takes about four minutes.
Start the free workflow diagnostic
Free, about four minutes, and read by Raquel herself.