AI and platform value,
created and realized.
Where AI-enabled platform investment meets value accountability and realization.
- Independent. No platform to sell, no resale incentive.
- Operator-built. Value practices led inside ServiceNow, SAP, Salesforce, and Cisco.
- Accountable. Measured to realization, not activity.
No one in the ecosystem is paid to own the value gap.
Vendors own the pre-sale ROI narrative. Systems integrators own the implementation. Strategy firms produce the strategy. None of them is paid to own whether the value actually shows up. Value Signal Advisory owns exactly that gap: conflict-free, operator-grounded, and right-sized for the $100M to $3B enterprise.
EBIT increase in transformed businesses when companies manage for value and adoption, versus 10% for those that skip those disciplines.
Source: BCG, "Performance and Innovation Are the Rewards of Digital Transformation," 2021.
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01 / Conflict-free
No platform, no build to protect
Zero resale and zero implementation revenue. VSA is paid for objectivity, not for a renewal or the next phase of work.
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02 / Insider
Built the vendors' own value math
Value Potential & Realization programs built inside ServiceNow and SAP. Craig looks at value across the entire AI and technology portfolio, not by silos.
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03 / Accountable
Measured to realization
Every engagement ties to a signal you can put in front of a board: value created, outcomes delivered, adoption sustained.
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04 / AI-collaborative
Works with AI, not against it
VSA works alongside AI rather than in conflict with it. What Craig brings is the layer AI cannot: judgment, hard-won experience, strategic prioritization, validated organizational readiness, and stakeholder alignment and sentiment.
The Three Signals™
Three questions decide whether an AI or platform investment is working. Each maps to a layer of stakeholder proof points, so value is visible from the boardroom to the front line.
Value Signal™
Is the investment producing measurable enterprise value, the financial and strategic outcome the business case promised?
Outcome Signal™
Are the operational outcomes the value depends on actually being delivered, at the speed and quality the case assumed?
Experience and Engagement Signal™
Are people adopting and using what was built, so the value holds after go-live instead of quietly eroding?
One value story, three layers of proof.
Each signal rolls up through a layer of proof built for the stakeholders who own it, so a single view runs from front-line adoption to enterprise value.
Three conflict-free offerings. One accountable owner.
Bounded, fixed-fee engagements that are easy to buy, each positioned in the gap that partners are structurally unable to own. Each one leads naturally into the flagship retainer.
AI Business Case Pressure-Testing
The conflict-free second opinion CFOs and CIOs need before committing capital. Every assumption deconstructed, benchmarked, and stress-tested into a clear proceed, renegotiate, or pause decision, in two to three weeks.
Vendor Contract & ROI Audit
Independent accountability for what you paid for and what you actually got. Utilization, adoption, and vendor ROI math audited into a renewal negotiation brief, by someone who built those value models from the inside.
Post-Implementation Value Recovery
Rescue the ROI from an implementation that delivered capability but not outcomes. A bounded diagnostic isolates the root cause, then a focused recovery program embeds the platform into how people actually work.
AI & Platform Value Executive
A fractional senior executive who leads and supports AI and platform value across the enterprise, sitting alongside your leadership team. Sets the value agenda, installs the Three Signals, and holds the organization accountable to realization, at a fraction of a full-time hire.
Start with a signal. Scale to accelerate.
Three levels of engagement, from a focused diagnostic to a senior executive embedded in your value agenda.
Signal
A focused diagnostic or assessment that locates where value is created and where it leaks, and gives you a defensible plan to close the gap.
Velocity
Governance, metrics, and cadence installed across the portfolio to accelerate realization and keep the Three Signals visible over time.
Scale for Acceleration
The AI & Platform Value Executive retainer, with senior leadership and support of value accountability across the enterprise.
Craig Hartman
Founder and Managing Director. Thirty-five years at the intersection of business strategy and enterprise technology, spent building and leading value realization inside the platforms that create the value. Across that span, Craig has guided enterprise value through five major technology transitions, from eBusiness and ERP to cloud, digital workflow, and now AI.
Figures reflect cumulative career and engagement impact and are not a guarantee of future results. See Terms.
- NowPublisher of The Value Signal.
- OpsValue realization leadership at ServiceNow, SAP, Salesforce, and Cisco, where he helped pivot the company from products to solutions.
- RootsStrategy consulting at Andersen Consulting / Accenture, AT Kearney, and Booz / Strategy&.
- EducationBS Industrial Engineering, Purdue. MBA, Washington University in St. Louis. Executive education: MIT Sloan (AI Implications for Business Strategy; Applied Generative AI for Digital Strategy) and Northwestern Kellogg (AI Applications for Growth).
A working point of view on AI and platform value.
Field notes for CFOs, CIOs, and operating partners on turning AI and platform investment into value the board can see. Published on Substack.
Is your AI and platform value showing up where it should?
One conversation is usually enough to know whether there is a value signal worth chasing, or noise worth cutting.