AI strategy consulting decides what AI should do inside a company before money goes to tools or builds. Kamyar Shah sets the problems, the order, the owners, and the limits. Each choice is tied to the operating system that already runs the business. The work fits founder-led companies of roughly 20 to 200 people.
Book the Free Ops Call →AI strategy consulting is senior advice on which business problems AI should address, in what order, and under whose ownership. The intended output is a written decision plan rather than a slide deck, with the exact deliverables set in the written scope. Kamyar Shah delivers it with the operating lens of a fractional COO, so each recommendation is checked against how the work actually runs.
Reviewed and current as of October 26, 2026.
Engagements are structured to address the specific challenges of your organization. Scope is defined collaboratively at the outset and adjusted as priorities evolve.
A common anti-pattern is buying a tool first and looking for a use afterward. That order puts the budget at risk before anyone knows what the tool should change. AI strategy consulting starts with the business plan and the constraint that limits growth, using the theory of constraints.
It also looks at the decisions leaders make each week. Only then does it ask where AI can remove work, speed a decision, or prevent a costly error.
Consider a services firm whose founder approves every proposal and every discount. A strategy review would test whether that approval queue is the constraint on growth. If the evidence supports it, the review would ask whether AI can draft proposals for review, not replace the approval itself. The design goal is a faster queue, with the founder still holding the final decision.
When the plan calls for a build, the work moves to the AI implementation engagement. That engagement documents the workflow and installs the system inside the company's own accounts. When the open question is broader business direction, business strategy consulting covers markets, priorities, and the annual plan.
A calm diagnosis of ownership comes before any tool decision. An AI plan without an owner tends to drift, because nobody answers for weak outputs or fading usage.
The engagement helps leadership designate one executive owner for company-wide AI decisions. It also helps name a process owner for each workflow that uses AI, so trust rests on people, not on the tool. Leadership approves their decision rights in a written RACI chart.
A review checkpoint sits wherever an AI output reaches a customer, a payment, or a personnel decision. Imagine a company that lets a sales assistant send quotes without a human review step. The plan would add a checkpoint before any quote is sent. Where logging fits, it would record approved run details under defined access and retention rules.
The plan also covers the controls a company of this size can actually run. These include a data inventory, least-privilege access, separate service accounts, and secrets kept out of prompts and code. Retention and model-training settings are documented from provider contracts, published documentation, and account controls. Legal and compliance questions go to the company's own counsel.
The recommended entry point is the AI Operations Audit, which costs $7,500 and runs two to three weeks. It maps the top workflows, scores readiness, and aims to rank three viable use cases with a baseline measure for each. The fee is credited in full against an install signed within 60 days of audit delivery. When the audit finds fewer than three viable use cases, the fee is refunded under the signed agreement, which defines a viable use case.
After the audit, AI strategy advice continues as a monthly retainer on the published strategy terms. A single advisory day each week is priced at $12,000 to $15,000 per month. Two advisory days each week are priced at $18,000 to $22,000 per month.
Any build sits outside that retainer, under the implementation terms. The published install price starts at $25,000, covering the first one or two workflows over eight to ten weeks. Operating support after the install begins at $5,000 per month, for at least three months.
Suppose a leadership team wants advice only and no build at all. The audit is the recommended entry point when a build is in view, and for advice-only work the advisory terms apply on their own. Kamyar Shah keeps no more than seven clients at any given time, and every active engagement counts toward that limit.
This work is not designed for a team that wants only a tool recommendation. It also does not suit a company unwilling to assign an executive owner and process owners, because the plan depends on people who answer for results.
Teams under 20 people may be better served by a tool-only approach, and the Free Ops Call says so when that applies. Kamyar Shah does not replace the company's legal or compliance counsel, and those questions stay with them.
$7,500, two to three weeks. A workflow map, a readiness score, three ranked use cases with baseline measures, and a build order.
See the Audit Terms →Strategy beyond AI, priced by the day per week. Markets, priorities, the annual plan, and the operating cadence that carries it.
See Strategy Consulting →Operational leadership one or two days a week for founder-led companies that need the operating system built and run.
See the Fractional COO Role →A good AI strategy names a few business problems, the order in which to address them, an owner for each, and a measure of success. It also states what the company will not do with AI, which protects budget and attention.
Strategy consulting decides what AI should do, in what order, and under whose ownership. Implementation documents a chosen workflow and builds the system inside the company's own accounts. Kamyar Shah offers both, and the audit connects them.
Two components are available. The optional AI Operations Audit costs a fixed $7,500 for two to three weeks of work. Advice-only engagements can use the monthly retainer without an audit, at $12,000 to $15,000 per month for one advisory day each week, or $18,000 to $22,000 for two.
The audit runs two to three weeks and ends with a written plan and a build order. Ongoing advisory then continues by the month, at a pace set in the written scope.
One executive should own AI decisions across the company, and one process owner should own each workflow that uses AI. In smaller companies that executive is often the COO or the founder, with an outside advisor in support.
It starts with the Free Ops Call, a 25-minute conversation about one workflow and the surrounding decisions. The call is used to judge whether the audit, strategy advisory, or neither looks like the right next step, and it says so when more information is needed.
Cite this page: Kamyar Shah, "AI Strategy Consulting," kamyarshah.com, https://kamyarshah.com/ai-strategy-consulting/
The Free Ops Call is a 25-minute conversation about one workflow and the AI decisions around it. It aims to end with a clear recommendation on the first step, and says so when more information is needed. Sometimes that step involves no AI work at all.
Book the Free Ops Call →Bringing Consulting to You: Where Strategy Meets Execution Kamyar Shah