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Technology decision studio

Three questions about a fictional company show which technology project fits it best, and the trade-offs. Then, if you like, build a full roadmap.

Time
About 6 minutes

Fictional data, run in your browser. It doesn’t connect to, scan or change any real system, and nothing you choose is sent to exQ.

Illustrative simulation

Step 1 of 3

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A fictional 35-person company has budget for one technology project this year. Three questions show which kind of project fits it best, and why.

What hurts most right now?

Want more? The full simulation has more settings, more scenarios and the reasoning behind every result.

Explore in more depth
Illustrative simulation

A fictional company. Scores are illustrative and say nothing about cost or return.

Initiatives under consideration

What matters most

Your roadmap

5 initiatives, about 3 per phase

  1. Stabilise

    Address urgent risks and the problems disrupting work now.

  2. Establish

    Put core controls and documentation in place.

  3. Improve

    Standardise and modernise the main systems.

  4. Optimise

    Expand and take on larger change.

    • Nothing in this phase.

Select any initiative on the roadmap to see why it sits there and how it scored.

What this shows

What changed
Starting point: a fictional company of 25 to 100 people with five initiatives selected.
Why
Each initiative gets an illustrative score from six dimensions, starts in the phase where that kind of work usually sits, then moves for its score, its dependencies and the capacity of each phase.
Business impact
Change the company, the initiatives or what matters most, and this explains what moved.
Trade-offs
The model is a conversation starter, not a plan: it can’t see your contracts, systems or people.

How the roadmap is built

The score
Each initiative has a value from 0 to 3 for six dimensions. The values are multiplied by weights set by what matters most, and added up. Current weights (balanced): business impact +2, risk reduction +2, urgency (your pain points) +1, implementation effort −1, operational disruption −1, cost uncertainty −1. The points only rank initiatives against each other for this profile.
The phases
Each initiative starts in the phase where that kind of work usually sits. Scoring 8 points or more moves it one phase earlier; 0 or less, one phase later. A high security priority brings identity and backup work into the first phase. Anything that depends on another initiative is placed after it.
The capacity of each phase
About 3 initiatives fit in a phase with this budget and internal capacity. If a phase holds more, the lowest-scoring ones move to the next.

Your planning summary

Built from the choices above. No dates, costs or savings: those need your real figures.

Planning summary

5 initiatives in 3 phases

Illustrative

Priorities, by illustrative score

  • Strengthen identity and access security (9 points)
  • Improve backup and recovery (8 points)
  • Improve IT support (7 points)
  • Improve IT documentation (4 points)
  • Modernise the cloud workspace (4 points)

Assumptions (your inputs)

  • 25 to 100, one office, working hybrid.
  • Technology maturity: developing. Internal IT capacity: one person.
  • Budget flexibility: moderate. Urgency: medium. Security priority: standard.
  • Pain points: IT problems disrupt work, security worries.
  • What matters most: balanced.

Suggested sequence

  • Stabilise: Strengthen identity and access security; Improve backup and recovery; Improve IT support.
  • Establish: Improve IT documentation.
  • Improve: Modernise the cloud workspace.
  • Optimise: nothing in this phase.

Dependencies

  • Modernise the cloud workspace depends on strengthen identity and access security.

Risks and unknowns

  • Strengthen identity and access security: locking people out without a plan for lost phones.
  • Improve backup and recovery: backups that report success but can’t be restored.
  • Improve IT support: choosing on price alone, without agreed response targets.
  • Improve IT documentation: documentation written once and never updated.
  • Modernise the cloud workspace: copying old permissions and clutter into the new workspace.
  • Modernise the cloud workspace: disruption if the move isn’t piloted first.

Questions for discovery

  • Strengthen identity and access security: which systems people sign in to.
  • Strengthen identity and access security: who holds admin access today.
  • Improve backup and recovery: which data the business can’t lose, and how long it can wait.
  • Improve backup and recovery: where backups live today.
  • Improve IT support: what support exists today, and where it falls short.
  • Improve IT support: the hours of cover the business needs.
  • Improve IT documentation: what already exists, and who will keep it current.
  • Modernise the cloud workspace: current licences and contracts.
  • Modernise the cloud workspace: data volumes, and what depends on the old systems.

Suggested first steps

  • List every account with admin rights, and turn on MFA for those first.
  • Restore one important folder and one database from backup, and see what comes back.
  • Write down last month’s IT problems and how long each took to fix.

Generated in your browser from the choices above. It is an illustration, not an assessment, and nothing is sent to exQ.

Explore your top priority

Cybersecurity decision lab

What the decision studio shows

Most organisations don’t lack ideas for IT improvements. They lack an order to do them in that the business can afford and absorb.

  • Order matters more than the list

    The same nine initiatives can make a sensible roadmap or a costly one depending on the order. Foundations (support, identity, backups, documentation) usually come before large change, because large change depends on them.

  • Make the trade-offs visible

    Impact, risk reduction, urgency, effort, disruption and cost uncertainty pull in different directions. Writing down how they are weighed, and letting people change the weights, turns an argument about opinions into a discussion about priorities.

  • Capacity is a real constraint

    A tight budget or no internal IT team doesn’t change what is worth doing; it changes how much can happen at once. A roadmap that ignores capacity looks fast on paper and stalls in practice.

  • Dependencies decide the sequence

    A cloud move depends on sound identity; a larger migration depends on documentation, identity and backups being in place. Missing foundations are flagged rather than assumed.

  • Precision would be false

    Without your real systems, contracts and figures, any date, cost or saving would be invented. The scores here only rank initiatives against each other for the profile you set.

  • From here to a real roadmap

    A real roadmap starts with discovery: what you have, what it costs, what is failing and what the business needs next. The questions in the summary are a good place to begin.

Discuss your technology roadmap with exQ.

The Lab shows the principles. Your environment, requirements and priorities decide the answer, so tell us about them. We reply to every enquiry within one business day.

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