I help public institutions, local governments and the boards of municipal and private companies make decisions about IT, vendors and projects, always on the client’s side. I don’t sell software and I don’t replace your IT department. You can come in at any point on the course and commission only the stage you need now.
It isn’t always obvious what you could ask for. My work starts by asking what result we expect.
Organisations often can’t put a name to what they want, because they don’t know what is possible. A request for a specific system is often a first idea rather than the goal. I ask about the goal and the definition of success, guide the analysis in a structured way, and only then choose the tool. Knowledge of the market and the available solutions is my greatest strength.
The questions I start with
- What does an ideal future look like to you?
- What isn’t working for you today?
- Why are we doing this?
- What’s the definition of done?
- What criteria will tell us this project has succeeded?
Very few organisations ask themselves these questions. They usually go straight to looking for a company that seems to have a system “for that”. That’s a sure way to waste time and money. An outside advisor with broad market knowledge navigates, asks the right questions and guides the organisation along the path that’s best for it, not for the vendor. That way you avoid mistakes and reduce risk before you buy anything. After all, do we really know the difference between EZD, ECM, case management, DMS, workflow and BPM?
- Case and document workflowworkflow, when the approval path and the decision trail matter
- No-code, low-code, pro-codewhen the process is specific to you and will keep changing
- RPAwhen integration is needed and standard interfaces aren’t available
- AIfrom analytical and generative AI to orchestrated agentic systems
- A document-management systemDMS, because sometimes that’s all you need
- ECM and case managemententerprise systems for managing all kinds of content and cases
- CRM / SRMprocess-driven, multi-channel management of relationships with customers, vendors and stakeholders
- Changing the procedurewhen reaching the goal doesn’t require a new system
- The public sector and professional self-regulatory bodiesProcedures from the paper era, carried on out of inertia. First a picture of the current state, then what you could ask for.
- Public utility companies“A KSeF invoicing system”, and underneath it a purchasing policy that needs putting in order.
- Business“We need a CRM”, when what’s actually needed is process-based handling of customers and quotes.
I bring market knowledge, 20 years of project experience, design thinking, structured problem-solving and an understanding of what vendors are really after. All so that digitalisation is simpler and cheaper, and your project doesn’t join those that sank hundreds of thousands or even millions of złoty when, from the outset, they could have been handled differently.
I don’t know everything, but I know where my knowledge ends. I can also tell what the organisation itself doesn’t know. When that happens, I bring the right expert into the team to see you through it, even though, without an advisor, the organisation often wouldn’t have realised it needed one.
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IT systems and process inventory
What do we actually have?
The starting point for every rollout decision. Before you choose a system, a vendor or a direction, you get a clear, structured picture of what you already have.
- A register of applications with owner, contract, licence, cost and end-of-support date.
- A map of supported and unsupported processes, a map of integrations and of where data is re-keyed by hand.
- A risk register, including single points of failure and vendor lock-in.
- A/B/C/D system categorisation and a one-page summary for the board.
2–6 weeks, below the public-procurement threshold.
The full scope of the inventory -
Needs analysis and workshops
What do we really need?
Internal workshops where we work out what the organisation genuinely needs. I often surface it with simple questions: what’s the definition of success? When will this project be judged a success? Companies and public offices very often skip this, either because they think they already know everything or because they simply have no time for deeper questions. It is one of the most common causes of problems in projects.
- Workshops with the board and the people who work in the process day to day: goals, expectations, constraints.
- A definition of success and the criteria that will tell you the project worked.
- A description of what isn’t working today and of what the future should look like.
- Input for the requirements or a market scan, or a decision that no new system is needed.
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Digital strategy and target architecture
Where are we going, and in what order?
A strategy that won’t end up in a drawer, because it is built on what the organisation actually has and says what to do in the next budget.
- A target architecture set out in layers: registers, processes, integrations and access.
- Standards the organisation adopts: a permissions model, an interface standard, rules for documenting requirements.
- A roadmap that separates regulatory obligations from investment.
- Procurement rules for system purchases and a budget split between investment and maintenance.
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Requirements and project preparation
How do we describe the needs so a vendor understands them?
Requirements written in the language of your processes, before you launch a tender or send a request for proposals. They make offers comparable and let you hold the vendor to account later.
- Interviews, process maps, a data model, integrations and test scenarios.
- Above all, an answer to the question of what counts as success for the rollout: why we’re doing this and what results we expect.
- When the board has an idea but no time to write it up: a concept or a prototype after a single conversation, in about 2 days.
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Offer evaluation and vendor conversations
How do we effectively compare different vendors’ offers?
An independent opinion alongside your IT team’s recommendation, not instead of it. The board gets a comparison it can base a decision on and defend before the council, the owner or head office.
- Questions for vendors and demos based on your own scenarios.
- A comparison matrix: offers normalised to a common scope, total cost over a multi-year horizon, maintenance and exit terms.
- For subsidiaries, a comparison against head-office purchasing guidelines, in English where needed.
- Taking part in vendor meetings as the client’s representative.
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Rollout, change and acceptance
How do we deliver the project, win people over and hold the vendor to it?
A major IT project is also a change in the way people work. Often the first of its kind in your organisation, though not in my practice. I represent the board on the delivery team and guide the change so that people actually adopt the new system. The board only needs to step back in when a decision is required.
- Oversight of scope, schedule and change decisions, with a log of changes and decisions.
- Change management: a communication plan, training, change ambassadors across departments, conversations with those not yet convinced.
- Short summaries for the board and for communicating with IT, the council or head office.
- Acceptance against agreed test scenarios and criteria, verified data migration.
- A maintenance contract that doesn’t lock you into one vendor more than is necessary.
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An ongoing advisor to the board
We have no IT director. Who keeps an eye on the whole picture?
A role known internationally as a “fractional CIO”, with one difference: I don’t take over the IT department or its budget. I translate the board’s intent into requirements, review IT’s recommendations, and represent the client’s interests in dealings with vendors.
- A monthly meeting with the secretary or CEO and the IT manager, a monthly operations-and-risk report.
- A quarterly review of risks and critical contracts, an opinion before any major purchase.
- The first 90 days: an initial assessment and any urgent “red flags”, setting up the registers and a contract review, a report for the board with a 12–24-month roadmap.
How long each stage takes depends on the organisation and the project: how prepared the organisation is, its organisational culture and the mandate the board provides. That’s why we set the scope and timeline after the first conversation. Only the inventory has a fixed price and timeline.
Presentations that defend decisions. To the board, the supervisory board and a wider group of decision-makers.
An advisor must do more than ask the right questions. They also need to be able to defend the assumptions, the report and the project’s results in front of the body that makes the decision. When you need a professional presentation that will convince your stakeholders, I bring experience from at least 126 conference talks, mostly in Poland but also in the United States and Ireland, as well as presentations to boards, supervisory boards and wider forums. I present technology in the language of decisions, risk and money.
- Recommending a project to the board or the supervisory board: current state, options, cost and risk.
- Defending a report and its results before a wider circle of decision-makers, including in the face of critical questions.
- A project concept and its results presented at a conference or industry forum.
Talk topics: information management and workflow, collaboration, e-commerce, systems architecture and integration, and user experience, as well as sector conferences for local government.
The same course, three different ports of departure.
Each group starts from a different question, but the path from information chaos to a decision you can defend is the same.
- Public sector – local governmentAn EZD-class system by 1 January 2028, a budget you can defend before the council, ready for an audit at any time.
- Public utility companiesInvoice workflow under KSeF, integration with the finance system, two offers in front of the board.
- BusinessAn ERP rollout or another major system, when your IT team is busy keeping things running.
Before you choose a stage.
How do we start working together?
With a free 30-minute conversation about the decision ahead of you. The first step is usually the inventory, since every later stage builds on its results. If a decision has already been made, or a project is under way, you can start at whichever stage you’re at.
Can we order just one stage, say offer evaluation?
Yes. Every point on the course is a separate service. I start with a narrow scope and widen it once both sides see it makes sense.
How much does each stage cost, and how long does it take?
The inventory takes 2–6 weeks. The scope, timeline and price of the other stages are set after the first conversation, since they depend on the organisation, the project, the team’s readiness and the mandate the board provides.
Tell me where you are on the course. I’ll suggest where to start.
- I reply within 2 business days
- First call: 30 minutes, no charge
- Independent of vendors