Discovery Sprint: How We Found $100K+ in Savings in 5 Days

Most consulting engagements start with a 6-week discovery phase. By the time you see a deliverable, you have already spent $50K and half your team's patience on workshops and interviews.

We think that is backwards.

Our Discovery Sprint is a 5-day, $5,000 engagement that delivers a complete AI automation roadmap for your tax practice - with specific, quantified savings opportunities you can act on immediately.

How It Works

Day 1: Workflow Mapping

We observe and document your current processes end-to-end. Not through PowerPoint - through direct observation of how work actually flows through your practice.

• Document intake and client onboarding
• Return preparation and review workflow
• Quality control and sign-off process
• Client communication cadence
• Regulatory update monitoring

Day 2: Data Analysis

We analyze your workflow data to identify bottlenecks, error patterns, and time sinks:

• Time-per-task benchmarks against industry standards
• Error rate analysis by workflow stage
• Seasonal capacity utilization patterns
• Technology utilization gaps

Day 3: Automation Mapping

We map each workflow against available AI/automation capabilities:

• Which tasks can be fully automated today?
• Which need human-in-the-loop AI assistance?
• Which are genuinely complex and should stay manual?
• What is the expected impact of each automation opportunity?

Day 4: ROI Modeling

We build a detailed financial model:

• Per-task time savings with confidence ranges
• Annual cost impact (labor, error correction, overtime)
• Implementation cost estimates for each automation
• Phased rollout recommendations

Day 5: Roadmap Delivery

You receive:

• Executive summary - 2-page overview with headline savings figure
• Detailed automation roadmap - prioritized list with ROI for each
• Implementation timeline - phased approach from quick wins to full transformation
• Technology recommendations - specific tools and integrations
• Risk assessment - what could go wrong and how to mitigate it

A Real Example

Details anonymized per client agreement.

A 75-person regional accounting firm came to us during a particularly brutal tax season. Their managing partner was losing sleep over two problems: senior associates threatening to quit, and a growing backlog of returns that would miss extension deadlines.

Here is what our Discovery Sprint uncovered in 5 days:

Finding 1: Document Intake Black Hole. Client documents arrived via email, portal, mail, and hand-delivery. A team of 4 spent 60% of their time just organizing and entering this data. Automation opportunity: $180K/year in labor reallocation.

Finding 2: Redundant Quality Checks. Three layers of manual review, each catching the same types of errors. The third review was finding issues in only 2% of returns - but consuming 400+ hours annually. Streamlining opportunity: $85K/year.

Finding 3: Regulatory Update Chaos. Tax law changes were tracked by a senior partner in a spreadsheet. Updates reached practitioners through monthly emails that 40% of staff admitted they did not read. Risk mitigation + time savings: $45K/year.

Finding 4: Seasonal Staffing Overshoot. The firm hired 12 seasonal contractors at premium rates. With automation handling intake and basic prep, they could reduce seasonal hires by 60%. Savings: $72K/year.

Total identified savings: $382K/year. Implementation cost estimate: $85K over 6 months. Payback period: under 3 months.

Why $5K?

We price the Discovery Sprint at $5,000 for a reason: it removes the risk of exploring AI automation.

• It is small enough to approve without a board meeting
• It is fast enough that it does not disrupt your practice
• It is concrete enough to make a go/no-go decision
• And if you proceed to implementation, we credit the $5K toward the project

We are not selling PowerPoint. We are selling clarity.

Is Your Firm Ready?

The Discovery Sprint works best for firms that:

• Have 20+ tax professionals
• Process 500+ returns annually
• Are feeling capacity pressure (seasonal or year-round)
• Have at least some digital document handling in place
• Have a decision maker who can commit 2-3 hours during the sprint week

Ready to see your automation roadmap? Book your Discovery Sprint or take our AI Readiness Scorecard first to see where your firm stands.