How we work
One call, one business day, no sales pitch.
The same four steps for a mock inspection and for a laboratory buildout. What changes is the size of step four.
Written scope · Named partner · Fixed or monthly fee · Nothing sold on the side
The engagement
Four steps, every time.
A twenty-minute call
You describe the laboratory and the problem. We ask the questions that decide scope. No slides, no pitch.
A written scope and fee
Within a few business days: what we will do, what you will receive, what it costs, and who leads it. Nothing starts until you sign it.
A named partner
One of the three of us owns the engagement and is the person you call. Named in the proposal, not assigned later.
The work, with a record
Every engagement ends in something you can hand to a surveyor, a board or a successor: a report, a plan, a file, a model.
How we charge
A fee you can see coming.
Fixed fee
For work with a defined end: a mock inspection, a validation package, a filing, a selection. Quoted after the scope call, in writing, before anything starts.
Monthly fee
For standing roles: a compliance retainer, a director of record, an interim seat, outsourced management. Thirty days notice, no penalty.
Phased fee
For a buildout, where the work runs in stages and the price of stage three depends on what stage one found.
Never a percentage
We do not take a share of collections on revenue work, because a percentage fee points a consultant at the easy dollars rather than the right ones.
Never a commission
No payment from an instrument maker, a software vendor or a reference laboratory, on any engagement, for any reason.
Expenses at cost
Travel billed as incurred, agreed in the scope, never marked up.
What you can expect in writing
Six things in every proposal.
If a proposal from us is missing one of these, ask for it.
- The problem as we understood it on the call
- What we will do, and what we will not
- What you receive, item by item
- The fee, and what changes it
- Who leads, by name
- How it ends, and what you keep
Independence, by design
What we will not do.
Operate a laboratory
We hold no interest in one. Nothing we recommend sends work to us.
Sell you anything else
No instruments, supplies or software. Advice on all three, paid for by you.
Take a second client on your engagement
One party pays us for the work, and it is the laboratory reading this page.
Promise a pass
No honest firm does. We commit to a complete finding and a plan you can execute.
Accept patient information by email
Engagements that need patient-level data get an agreement and a secure channel first.
Drift
Every engagement has a defined end. Extensions are by agreement, in writing.
Start with the call.
You have read how it runs. The call is step one.