What your IT support contract is probably still charging you for
Most support contracts are priced for the organisation you were when you signed them. Here is how to find out what yours assumes, before the renewal lands.
Freelance IT consultant. I do the thinking and the doing.
Roadmaps and supplier decisions for organisations that have outgrown ad-hoc IT. Then the hands-on work as well: websites built, CRMs untangled, projects run, support that actually resolves. Independent, remote-first, South East England.
ROUTE ONE
I run an organisation
You need someone senior to own the decisions and stay long enough to see them through. Strategy, systems, suppliers, and a plain answer when you ask what it will cost.
IT strategySupport & managed careCRM & dataProject management
ROUTE TWO
I build things
Agencies and developers: an extra pair of senior hands, or the person who talks to the client's IT department so you don't have to. I still write the code, so nothing gets lost in translation.
Web developmentData migrationsIntegrationsTechnical partnership
WHAT I DO
Eight things, and most engagements draw on two or three of them. You are buying days, not a package.
01
IT strategy & roadmaps
What to do next year and why, costed, in language your board can challenge.
02
IT support & managed care
Someone reliable behind the day-to-day, and someone who fixes the causes as well as the tickets.
03
Web development
Sites and web applications built to last, fast by default, handed over documented.
04
CRM & data
Selection, data models and migrations. Currently contracted to an authorised CRM solution provider, and free to advise independently on other systems.
05
Infrastructure & cloud
Networks, servers and Microsoft 365 tenancies: designed, moved and left in a state someone else can pick up.
06
Project management
Migrations and system replacements run to a date you can tell your staff. PRINCE2 or agile, whichever the work needs.
07
Agency technical partnership
Named on your pitch, in the room for the technical questions, available by the day once you win it.
08
Training & handover
Your team able to run it without me. Written down, not just demonstrated.
WHY THE ADVICE LANDS
I have worked the support desk. I know exactly what my recommendations will feel like at eight on a Monday morning.
Then
Digital Equipment Corporation, enterprise systems support and software engineering
Later
Web development, then IT and project management
Recently
Director of IT, international charity
Now
Independent, and still building
Recent writing
All articlesWriting a CRM migration you can run twice
Idempotent imports, reconciliation reports, and why the dry run is the actual deliverable. With the reconciliation query I hand to finance teams.
Nobody owns your roadmap. That is the actual problem
Why competent support and stalled progress so often turn up together, and the cheapest way to tell which one you are dealing with.
Start with a conversation.
Half an hour, no charge. If I am not the right fit I will say so.