Resources · Framework reference
The Five Checkpoints.
What we examine in every engagement. Five dimensions, each scored on two separate axes — how much unmet need exists, and how much is already in place. Use this to assess yourself, whether or not you ever hire us.
The five, one at a time
Each one asks two different questions.
Most readiness assessments collapse into a single score, which hides the thing you need to know: whether your problem is exposure you have not addressed, or capability you have not built. Those need opposite responses.
Opportunity & Readiness
Where AI-enabled or operational change could plausibly create value — and whether the organization is in a position to capture it.
Manual, repetitive work consuming significant staff hours each week. Peers or competitors already using tools you do not.
A leadership sponsor who would fund a clear plan. At least one internal champion who could own the work day to day.
A named sponsor, and one person who owns it with the capacity to actually do it. Enthusiasm without capacity is the most common failure here.
Risk & Governance
Policy, accountability, use-case approval, vendor oversight, escalation, and human review.
AI or automated tools touching any employment decision. Employees, applicants, or customers in a state with active AI regulation.
A written acceptable-use policy that has been adopted and communicated. A named owner with real authority to monitor and enforce it.
A policy people have read, an owner with authority rather than a title, and an escalation path someone has actually used.
Workforce & Leadership Impact
Role impact, manager readiness, trust, skills, training, and employee participation.
Day-to-day roles changing materially for a meaningful share of staff. Anxiety or resistance already surfacing.
Leadership has discussed the workforce impact openly, more than once. A track record of leading significant change well.
People have heard it from a leader repeatedly, and their manager can answer the obvious questions without deflecting.
Workflow & Operating System Design
Process redesign, decision rights, handoffs, SOPs, quality controls, and performance management.
Frequent handoffs across people, tools, and systems. Institutional knowledge concentrated in one or two people.
Workflows documented well enough that a new hire could follow them unassisted. A record of implementing new systems successfully.
Documentation that is maintained rather than written once. Automation laid over undocumented friction multiplies the friction.
Adoption & Value Realization
Whether change is actually adopted — and whether its value is measured and sustained rather than assumed.
A deadline or competitive pressure forcing near-term action. A prior pilot that stalled without a decision to relaunch or stop.
A way to measure whether an initiative delivered value. Leadership reviewing adoption on a set cadence.
A baseline captured before launch, and a standing review after it. Without the baseline there is nothing to measure against later.
The scoring
Why a gap beats a readiness score.
Each Checkpoint gets two scores on a 0–5 scale. Exposure is how much unmet need exists. Maturity is how much is already in place to meet it. They are recorded separately and never averaged into one number.
The priority score is the gap between them: (exposure + (5 − maturity)) ÷ 2. A high gap means significant need with little in place. A low gap can mean either low exposure or high maturity — which is why you have to keep both axes visible.
Urgent
High exposure, low maturity. Real need, nothing built. This is where engagements start.
Maintain
High exposure, high maturity. You built it and the need is real — keep it current rather than rebuilding.
Monitor
Low exposure, low maturity. Nothing built, but nothing pressing either. A lower near-term priority.
Efficient
Low exposure, high maturity. Ahead of the curve. Do not spend here.
One override: if Checkpoint 2 scores a gap of 2.5 or higher, we treat it as urgent regardless of where it ranks against the others. State AI law has deadlines, and those deadlines do not care about your sequencing.
Using this honestly
Two things you should know before you rely on it.
This instrument was built from our own governance methodology and has been pressure-tested internally through a simulated engagement. It has not yet been run with a paying client. We would rather say that plainly than imply a track record we have not earned yet.
And a self-assessment is not a diagnostic. Reading these questions and scoring yourself will tell you roughly where you stand, which is genuinely useful. What it cannot do is interview your managers, read your policies, or notice the gap between what a document says and what your organization does. That difference is most of what we get paid for.