Apex, the first 90 days.

A note from Chris to Ray, written the week the build started. This is the plan a real client gets: short, in order, and honest about what has to happen before the clever part works.

Ray,

I tell people who are bold enough to finally put AI to work in their business that it only works on documented data. You have thirty years of it. It is in binders, and it is in the head of one technician who is getting ready to retire. That is your biggest asset and your biggest risk, in the same building. Every year the binders get older and the head gets closer to the door. So the order is simple: get it out of the binders first, then put the clever tools on top of it.

Days 1 to 30: get the knowledge out of the binders

• Scan the binders. Every manual, every service report, every revision. We tag each page with the model and the serial range it covers. This is the boring part, and it is the part that makes the rest work.
• Ticket drafts. Every dealer ticket gets a drafted reply that cites the exact manual page and the last three service visits on that serial. Carla reads and approves every one. Tell me which drafts she rewrites and I will fix the cause, not the draft.
• The search desk. Mateo and the service team ask a plain question and get the answer, the page and the fixes that worked before. Your retiring technician reviews the first fifty answers. His judgment goes in on day one, not after he leaves.
• What I need from you: the binders, one hour a week with Carla, and a few afternoons with the technician who knows where the bodies are buried.

Days 31 to 60: price watch and the first read of your dealers

• Price watch. Forty dealers, checked daily against your floor prices. A below-floor listing shows up within a day, not a quarter later. A drafted note to the dealer waits for you.
• Dealer notes go through approval. Nothing goes to a dealer unless you or Carla say so. The rule I will not bend: a person sends every note, every time.
• The first Dealer pulse. A RadRoot read sent to the dealer principals. It shows who feels supported and who is about to go quiet. Dealers who go quiet do not complain first. They just stop calling.
• What I need from you: your floor prices in one list, and your word that you will read the pulse yourself.

Days 61 to 90: the shop floor

• The shop dashboard. On-time ship rate, rework, backlog by line and this month's forecast, on one screen. Ask it "why is line 2 behind?" and get a plain answer. Gus will tell you within a week whether he trusts it.
• Meeting capture. The production meeting is recorded, and it comes out as action items with owners and due dates. Nothing said at that table gets lost.
• RadSim before every shift change, for a month. Supervisors rehearse the handoff with a simulated night-shift lead before the real one. Dee goes first, because she will tell me what is wrong with it.
• Decide the next build from the reads. I will bring you the three things the data says, ranked. You say go to one.

What this costs and what it does not

The service desk is a RadWorks build: a monthly subscription, no setup fee, and the first month's scope is written before you pay. RadRoot and RadSim are each their own subscription and you can switch either off. My time is the part that scales down, not up: by day 90 you should need me for a monthly note and a quarterly build decision, and not for the Tuesday.

Got a binder problem? Got a dealer problem? Happy to chat.

Chris

Apex is a fictional company. The plan is real in shape: it is how Rad sequences a build for any business with thirty years of paper and one person who knows where everything is.