Automation and self-hosting for remote-run, multi-location service businesses.
I work with remote-run and multi-location service businesses — residential cleaning is home turf, and the same patterns hold in landscaping, pest control, junk removal, and adjacent trades.
I'm most useful early, when the question is still what should and shouldn't be automated — before anyone has bought a platform.
Deciding what to automate and what to leave alone. This is most of the value and the part people skip.
Self-hosting evaluations, including the security screen. I rejected three widely-recommended open-source tools on vulnerability grounds; that evaluation is documented and repeatable.
Building an operations layer with guardrails that actually hold — and knowing the difference between a guardrail that's a permission and one that's a promise.
I won't promise you time-saved numbers. I don't measure them in my own business and I'm not going to invent them for yours.
I won't recommend automating customer communication. The downside is asymmetric: a missed insight costs you an opportunity, a bad automated message costs you the customer and you find out last.
I won't tell you to replace your booking platform or your system of record. Replace the glue and the commodity tools. Leave the thing your business is made of alone.
Tell me what you're running and I'll tell you which parts of this would break in your operation.
No pitch, no deck. If it turns into work, we'll talk about that then.