Start
“We know we need to do this. We don't know where to begin.”
First stepExecutive fluency, team onboarding, or a strategy and roadmap.
Read this situationSterling North Partners
Your team is at capacity. Hiring is not the answer. You already know AI is part of it.
That is the most common version. Sometimes it is a list nobody has time to clear, or a program nobody can put a number on. Whichever one is yours, what you want is the same thing: something that works in your department, on your numbers, and is still working a year from now.
We integrate AI into how your departments work: built with the people who do the work, measured on their own numbers, and run by whoever can keep it alive.
Four statements. One of them is probably yours.
- Start“We know we need to do this. We don't know where to begin.”
- Keep up“One department can't keep up, and we can't hire our way out of it.”
- Go faster“This is working. We are nowhere near building it fast enough.”
- Stay in control“We're bringing AI into the whole company. We need to keep tight control, build the right things, and see the return.”
15+
Years in operations, consulting and technology
10+
Years delivering AI and automation programs
7+
Years operating automated workflows in production
Four situations
Which situation is yours?
Pick yours. The page that follows is about your situation, not about us.
Keep up
“One department can't keep up, and we can't hire our way out of it.”
First stepA department diagnostic.
Read this situationGo faster
“This is working. We are nowhere near building it fast enough.”
First stepA prioritization pass, then the capacity to clear it.
Read this situationStay in control
“We're bringing AI into the whole company. We need to keep tight control, build the right things, and see the return.”
First stepSettle the ambition, then size the structure.
Read this situationHow we work
Two questions before any build.
What is the impact, and what will it take to build?
Sand, pebbles and rocks. Our own shorthand, used on every engagement.
- Sand. Small initiatives the working team builds for itself, guided by an expert, with nothing for your technology team to host or support.
- Pebbles. Light systems that live somewhere and run on their own, that a named person in the business can keep going without a specialist.
- Rocks. New systems that need technical specialists for as long as they run.
Who will run it in a year?
Put plainly: when it hiccups at seven in the morning, whose phone rings.
- The working team runs it alone. The people who use it every day also keep it going.
- Your technology team absorbs it. It joins what they already maintain, if they have the room.
- Someone external runs it. It runs on our side, we operate and improve it, and you pay for what you use.
The second answer depends on who you actually have rather than on what anyone would prefer, and we agree it together before a single thing gets built.
Results
What this looks like in practice.
Four departments that work differently now. Every number came off the client's own reporting rather than an industry benchmark, and there is a full story behind each one.
100K+
Parts categorized in 4 days, out of a program of 120,000. Two months by hand had cleared ten to twenty thousand.
Who builds this
Philippe Marcotte, Managing Director and Founder
I led AI and analytics transformation engagements at McKinsey as an Engagement Manager, then built and operated a venture-backed network of tech-enabled medical clinics where I had to implement it rather than recommend it. As a partner in an industrial consulting firm, I delivered AI-enabled systems inside complex manufacturing organizations. Sterling North is where all of that converges.
Sterling North is small by design. Senior people stay close to the work, and the people who build it are the people you meet.
Senior people do the work here, and you always know who is on your engagement.
Not sure which situation is yours?
A thirty-minute strategy call sorts it out. We work out which situation you are in, what the first step would be, and roughly what it would take. You get our honest read either way, including when the answer is that this is something you could do yourselves.
Free. No commitment. Thirty minutes.