What actually happens in a 7-day build

Consultants get hired, disappear for a month, and come back with a deck. I do the opposite, so here's the whole week, day by day, with nothing mysterious about it.

Day 1: you talk, I take notes

One conversation, usually an hour. No forms, no intake questionnaire, no homework. You tell me how a job runs from first call to final payment, and where it hurts. I ask about the exceptions, because the exceptions are where automations die.

While we talk, I'm inside your tools with the access you gave me, seeing how things are actually set up. Not how the vendor's demo says they should be.

Day 2: I pick the target, you approve it

Out of everything we found, one responsibility gets picked. Chosen for payoff, and for how cleanly it can be stopped. I send you one paragraph: here's the target, here's what the system will do, here's what it will never do without your click. You reply "go" or you redirect me. That reply is the whole approval process.

Days 3 to 5: the build

I build inside the software you already pay for. If the target is unconfirmed change orders, the system watches for scope changes, drafts the confirmation with the dollar amount, and holds it for your one-click yes. If it's aging invoices or unsent follow-ups, same shape: watch, draft, hold, brief you each morning.

Your crew is not involved. They learn nothing new, install nothing, and most of them will never know anything changed except that the office stopped calling them about paperwork.

Day 6: I try to break it

Every system I ship has to survive four tests before it goes live:

• The normal case. Does the happy path run clean end to end?
• No response. The client never replies. Does it follow up politely, then flag you, instead of going silent or going rabid?
• Missing info. The invoice has no PO number. Does it ask, or does it guess? It had better ask.
• Duplicate submission. The same thing arrives twice. Does it catch that, or double-bill your client?

A system that only handles the normal case is a liability with good manners. The failure tests are the actual product.

Day 7: live, with guardrails

It goes live with the 1-Click Approval Guardrails on. Everything it drafts, it holds. You read, you click, it sends. And the next morning your first Daily Brief arrives: what it watched, what it drafted, what needs your yes.

Then comes my favorite part, which is nothing. The system runs. You stop thinking about it. Somewhere around week three most clients tell me they forgot it was there, which is the entire point.

The first 30 days of watching are included. I check the logs, catch the weird edge cases your business invents, and tighten the rules. After that, the Watch Plan is optional at $350 a month, and plenty of clients run without it.