Purpose

The Retainer provides flexible, ongoing advisory capacity. It is designed to prevent "drift" after an engagement or to support leaders who need a consistent external partner for decision-making, architecture reviews and leadership guidance.

Unlike sprints, the Retainer does not include ownership of execution. It is purely advisory, ensuring your team owns the outcome.

How the Retainer Is Used

The Advisory Retainer may be used in three distinct ways depending on context:

  • Included with select engagements: Retainer time is bundled to provide continuity and availability immediately following implementation work.
  • Standalone advisory support: Organizations may engage the retainer independently for ongoing guidance without a prior engagement.
  • Paused during an Evolution Sprint: Retainer support is paused while advisory focus is concentrated into the sprint window.

Where Retainer Support Adds the Most Value

  • Leadership Decision Support: Sanity-checking high-impact decisions such as organizational changes, role definitions, escalation paths or investment tradeoffs.
  • Architecture and Technical Direction: Reviewing proposed system designs, identifying scaling risks, and helping teams reason through long-term technical tradeoffs without taking ownership of delivery.
  • Process and Operating Rhythm Review: Evaluating whether planning, execution and feedback loops are working as intended and identifying early signs of drift.
  • Second-Brain Support: Acting as an external thinking partner during moments of uncertainty, change or increased organizational pressure.

These examples are illustrative, not exhaustive. Retainer support adapts to the organization’s needs and context as they evolve.

How Retainer Time Is Used

Retainer support is not intended to function as rigid time buckets. The monthly allocation represents advisory capacity and availability, used flexibly based on need.

Some months may involve more interaction, others less, depending on timing, decisions and active initiatives.

What This Is Not

The Advisory Retainer is not designed for large-scale implementation, major reorganizations or intensive delivery work. When deeper execution is required, a time-bound engagement such as an Enablement or Evolution Sprint may be a better fit.