Technology · Infrastructure

What we do · The Infrastructure Survey

Before it breaks

Most founders can describe their system. Fewer have had it actually read by someone outside the building. The Infrastructure Survey pulls evidence out of what is really running, rather than out of what you believe is running, and hands back a ranked list of what would give way first.

What it is

The Infrastructure Survey is a read of your running system by someone who did not build it: where it actually lives, who can deploy a change today, and whether a backup has ever really been restored. Evidence is pulled directly from the system rather than taken on your word for it. It ends with a written opinion and a ranked list of what would break first, ordered by how cheap it is to fix against what it would cost if it did not.

What you receive

  • 01

    Current state, verified

    We read what is actually running today: where it lives, who besides you can deploy a change to production, and whether the setup could be explained to a stranger in five minutes. A "just me" answer to who can deploy is the single most common finding among founders who take this Survey. It is not a personal failing. It is a finding.

  • 02

    Traffic and growth readiness

    We compare what the system handles today, tested rather than guessed, against what the business believes is coming in the next six to twelve months. The gap between the two numbers is usually the real finding, more than either number on its own.

  • 03

    Backup posture, tested

    We check whether a restore has ever actually been tried, not merely assumed to work, and how old the most recent good copy really is. An untested backup is functionally not a backup. This is the single highest-leverage finding on the whole Survey relative to how cheap it usually is to fix.

  • 04

    Security posture

    We read who currently has access to the production environment, how they log in, and whether the system has already shown signs of unwanted attention. Every system on the open internet is already being tested by strangers, whether anyone has looked at the logs yet or not.

  • 05

    Single points of failure

    We name the one person, one server, one vendor account, or one password that would stop the product from running if it disappeared today. Where more than one exists, we name all of them, ranked by how likely each one is to actually happen.

The Survey ends with a written read handed back to you directly, not buried in a slide deck. If an Infrastructure Blueprint is warranted, the read names it plainly.

What it needs from you

  • Read access to the running system: the console, the repository, and the deployment path
  • An hour with whoever currently holds the keys to production
  • A single point of contact who can get us the right access quickly
  • Time on the calendar for the work to run, agreed before it starts

How it ends

The Infrastructure Survey ends with a written read, not a slide deck presented once and forgotten. You receive a ranked list of what would give way first regardless of what you decide next, and if a Blueprint is warranted, the read names the exact gap it would need to close.

Where it fits

The Infrastructure Survey is the Survey rung of the Technology area's Infrastructure lane: the floor everything else in your business stands on, read before anyone relies on it. It precedes the Infrastructure Blueprint. See How we work for the full sequence.

Where to go from here

Book an hour with us, no charge. Or take the Growth Check first, about fifteen minutes, to see where your own constraint sits before the call.