Prepare a cloud or AI advisory request

Start with the decision

Describe the business outcome and the decision you need help making. Examples include choosing a migration approach, reviewing an architecture, evaluating an AI workflow, or clarifying operating responsibilities. Explain what exists today and why a change is being considered.

Provide useful context

1. Identify the systems and business processes involved.
2. Describe users, expected scale, and important integrations.
3. State budget or timing constraints if already known.
4. Identify security, data-handling, and approval requirements supplied by your organization.
5. Define what a successful recommendation or pilot should demonstrate.

For an AI use case, describe the task, permitted data sources, human review needs, and actions the system would be allowed to take. Synthetic examples are often enough for an initial discussion.

Separate advice from implementation

An architecture review, proof of concept, production rollout, and ongoing operations can have different scopes and owners. Ask the team to clarify the proposed deliverable and what work would follow from it.

Prepare a safe first handoff

Share a high-level diagram or redacted example rather than live credentials or a complete private dataset. If deeper access becomes necessary, agree its purpose and method separately. Keep decisions and outstanding questions on the request so the next review starts from a clear record.