Professional and advisory firms
Client files that stay private, and AI your people can use safely.
Accountants, advisers, consultants and capital firms sell trust and knowledge. Both sit in files, inboxes and people’s heads, and both are at risk when someone pastes a client document into a chatbot.
What it means for you
Client trust protected
You can show where files are and who has seen them.
AI without the worry
Your people get the time saving, with rules they will follow.
Know-how that stays
What the firm knows stops leaving when people do.
What owners usually ask for
- “We need to share files with clients securely.” Expiring links, upload links and a record of who opened what. No attachments, no personal accounts.
- “We are raising money, selling, or being looked at.” A data room a diligence team can navigate, with access you can prove and withdraw.
- “Staff are using AI and I don’t know what they put in.” A plain-English policy, approved tools, and a way of working that is easier than the workaround.
- “We can never find the last time we did this.” Your own documents, searchable by question, with the source shown and permissions respected.
- “We have offices that do not work as one.” One governed place for files and reporting, and people who actually use it.
Where I have done this
The experience behind it
Data rooms for capital and advisory firms
Secure data rooms and members areas with controlled external access, expiring links, permissions by group and a record of who opened what. Built on Egnyte®, so the firm keeps the structure afterwards rather than starting again for the next deal.
An engineering consultancy, from the inside
Office systems and quality manager, then IT and change manager through an acquisition: five Asian offices brought together on secure IT, management systems and reporting while live projects carried on, with working groups and weekly change briefings. I also wrote the quality management system and took it through external certification.
Investment analysis
An AI-assisted diligence method that produced a seven-document investment committee set on a live target, with the verdict holding up under repeated independent testing. A headline return figure was dropped because it could not be defended.
Bringing a new professional offer to market
At a consulting firm, set up the partnership with a Canadian training company that brought PMP project management training to Hong Kong, with paid courses delivered to blue-chip companies.
Being straight about it. This is operational and technology advice. I do not give legal, audit or investment advice, and where you need a lawyer I will say so and tell you what to ask them.
Good places to start
Worried about where client files end up?
A short call is enough to see what you have and what needs fixing first.