Sterling North Partners
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The Transformation
Diagnostic

A structured assessment of your organization across six transformation pillars — designed to tell you exactly where you stand, what the priority is, and what it will actually take to change it.

No slide deck. No generic recommendations. A working engagement with a concrete output.

What You Leave With
A clear picture and a concrete plan
Current state assessment across all six transformation pillars — honest, not flattering
Priority ranking of the highest-value opportunities for your organization specifically
Recommended sequence — what to tackle first and why, with dependencies mapped
Investment and timeline estimates per pillar, so you can plan and sequence the spend
A clear answer on whether a full transformation is warranted — or whether a Solver or AI Worker addresses the immediate need
What the Diagnostic Is

A Working Engagement.
Not a Discovery Call.

Most consulting engagements start with a free conversation and end with a proposal. The Transformation Diagnostic is different — it is the first billable phase of the engagement. You pay for our time, we deliver a concrete output. The proposal comes out of the diagnostic, not before it.

That means you get something valuable regardless of whether we work together further. And it means we only show up with recommendations we actually earned — not ones we invented to justify a follow-on scope.

Most organizations have never had someone walk through their operations and tell them honestly where they stand relative to where they need to be.

That is what the diagnostic delivers. Not a benchmark against an abstract best practice. A realistic assessment of your specific organization — and a clear view of the gap between today and where you need to go.

The diagnostic is valuable on its own. If you take the output and implement it yourself, that is a good outcome. We would rather you have a clear roadmap than feel obligated to continue with us.
How the Diagnostic Works

From First Call
to Delivered Roadmap

The scope depends on your organization. A focused diagnostic of a single-site, 50-person company might take two to three days. A complex multi-site manufacturer with seven departments and a fragmented tech stack might take three to four weeks. The scoping form below will give you a realistic estimate before you commit to anything.

  • 01
    Sponsor Kickoff Call

    A one-hour call with the executive sponsor — the person who owns the transformation decision. We align on objectives, define the scope, sign the NDA, and confirm the diagnostic plan. This is where the engagement formally begins.

    1 hour · Executive Sponsor
  • 02
    Department Head Interviews

    Structured 45-minute interviews with each department head — covering how work actually flows, where the real friction is, what's been tried, and what the team's capacity and capability actually looks like on the ground.

    45 min each · All relevant departments
  • 03
    SOP & Documentation Review

    We review existing process documentation — what exists, how current it is, how complete it is, and whether it reflects how work is actually done. This is usually where the most surprising gaps emerge.

    Async · Shared documentation access
  • 04
    Tech Stack Evaluation

    An assessment of your current technology infrastructure — what systems are in use, how they connect, where there are integration gaps, and what the realistic foundation for AI deployment looks like today.

    Working session · IT lead + operations
  • 05
    Pain Point Mapping

    A structured session to surface, categorize, and prioritize the highest-cost operational constraints — what they cost in time and money, how frequently they occur, and which ones are addressable with AI and automation.

    Working session · Cross-functional
  • 06
    Readout & Proposal

    We deliver the full assessment — current state across all six pillars, priority ranking, recommended sequence, and investment estimates. The proposal for the transformation engagement is presented at this session for discussion, not sent ahead of time.

    2 hours · Executive Sponsor + leadership team
The Six Pillars Assessed
1
Clarity
Standards & documentation
2
Visibility
Performance management
3
Augmentation
AI Workers
4
Elimination
AI Solvers
5
Structure
Org design
6
Adoption
Change enablement
On confidentiality

A mutual NDA is signed before the sponsor kickoff call. Everything you share — process details, financials, team structure — stays confidential. You can request NDA signing in the scoping form below.

Scope Your Diagnostic

Tell Us About Your Organization

Answer a few questions and we'll give you a realistic estimate of the diagnostic effort — so you know roughly what to expect before we speak. The more specific you are, the more accurate the estimate.

Step 01
Your Organization
Step 02
Current State
Step 03
Pain Points
Step 04
Your Details
About Your Organization
Basic context helps us size the diagnostic effort accurately.
<50
Under 50
50–200
Growing team
200–500
Mid-size
500–1k
Large org
1,000+
Enterprise
?
Not sure
<$5M
Early stage
$5–25M
Growing
$25–100M
Mid-market
$100–500M
Scale
$500M+
Enterprise
Prefer not to say
Your Current State
Understanding where you are today across the six pillars helps calibrate the diagnostic scope.
None / outdated
Most processes undocumented
Partial
Some docs, inconsistent quality
Complete
Most processes documented and current
Managing by feel
No structured KPIs or dashboards
Partial
Some metrics, not consistent
Good visibility
KPIs tracked across most areas
Simple
1–3 core systems, well integrated
Moderate
Several systems, some integration gaps
Complex
Many systems, fragmented, legacy tools
Starting out
Little to no AI in use today
Experimenting
Tools deployed, limited impact so far
Advancing
AI in production, looking to scale
What You're Trying to Solve
Select all that apply. This helps us understand which pillars are most relevant for your diagnostic.
Our processes aren't documented or are outdated — we need a standard
We don't have consistent performance visibility across the organization
We have recurring operational work that should be handled by AI, not people
We have a specific high-burden problem we haven't been able to fix
We've grown but aren't sure our org structure and team size are right for where we're going
We've deployed tools before and they didn't stick — adoption is the challenge
Your Diagnostic Estimate
Based on your answers — before our review
to
working days
    One Last Step
    Tell us who you are and we'll reach out within 2 business days with our read on the estimate and a proposed next step.
    I would like Sterling North to sign an NDA before our first call.
    We'll prepare and send a mutual NDA for signature before the sponsor kickoff call. No information will be shared or discussed before it's in place.

    Philippe reviews every submission personally. You'll receive a response within 2 business days with our read on the estimate and a proposed next step.

    Step 1 of 4
    Not sure the diagnostic is the right first step?

    Start with a 30-minute strategy call.

    We'll help you figure out whether a full diagnostic is warranted — or whether a Solver or AI Worker addresses your most pressing constraint right now.

    Book a Strategy Call →