Cases/01 · AI investments
A pharmaceutical consultancy needed to scale its Data Science offering and embed modern product practice across an organisation that had grown organically. The Data Science sat within a department of approximately 30 people, with real demand and real talent — and a structure that had been built for a smaller version of itself.
Challenge
The Data Science offering needed to scale, but the structure underneath it didn't yet support scale: product definitions were fluid, pricing was based on what the work cost rather than what it was worth, and project delivery ran on improvisation rather than a repeatable system. Add an organic-growth pattern and you get a unit that does great work — and struggles to grow.
What was done
The total Data Science offering was redefined end-to-end: products, services, pricing, and operations. Vanilla Scrum was implemented across IT projects. Customer personas, Lean UX Canvas, and Design Thinking were embedded as the cross-organisation methodology — not a poster on the wall but the actual way commercial projects, solution architecture, phases, tools, and knowledge management came to work. An AI-driven omnichannel Customer Data Platform was brought in, adding a complementary revenue stream.
Outcome
YoY topline growth across the business
Revenue growth in the Data Science offering in less than two years
Modern product practice embedded as part of how the organisation operates — not a methodology on a wiki but the working practice across the department.
Practitioner
Simon — Commercial strategy, Product, Operating model, Methodology embedding.
Where this fits
This case maps to 'Our AI investments aren't landing'. A Data Science offering inside a consultancy is itself an AI investment — and this one was failing to land at scale. The bottleneck wasn't the technology; it was the products, pricing, and methodology. The engagement combined an Analysis (defining the right product taxonomy and pricing model) with Implementation (the methodology, the operating cadence) and a Sustain-style window post-rebuild to ensure adoption stuck.