Services — Consulting & Audit

Consulting & audit: scoping before building

Launching a development project without prior scoping means risking building the wrong solution — on budget, on time, but not solving the real problem. Audit and consulting work identify what's actually holding you back, prioritise the right initiatives, and structure a project that holds together.

Groupe Milestone provides consulting and audit services for organisations that want to make informed decisions before committing — and for those with a system already in place who want to understand why it's no longer performing.

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01 — Scope

What is consulting & audit for digitalisation?

Our consulting and audit engagements cover two broad needs: understanding what exists, and structuring what comes next.

A

The audit: understanding what exists

  • Application audit: assessment of your IT system, technical architecture, code quality, and accumulated technical debt.
  • Digital maturity audit: a comprehensive assessment of your processes, tools and organisation to identify performance levers.
  • Compliance audit: verification of alignment with regulatory obligations (GDPR, AI Act for AI systems).
  • AI audit & literacy: identifying where AI genuinely creates value in your processes — and where it exposes you (unmanaged AI usage, AI Act Article 4 obligations). We map real use cases, assess their risk level, and lay the groundwork for governance suited to your context.
B

The consulting: structuring what comes next

  • Functional scoping: precisely defining the scope, use cases, business rules and integrations.
  • Technology choice: independent arbitration between available options (bespoke vs off-the-shelf software, sovereign cloud vs public cloud, appropriate AI technologies).
  • Digital strategy: a roadmap for your digital transformation, structured in stages consistent with your resources and priorities.
  • Decision-maker literacy: a shared understanding of AI, built on your real use cases, so you can make informed decisions before investing in a tool or a development project.
  • Public procurement support: helping public authorities articulate their needs in operational terms ahead of a procurement process.
01b — AI literacy

AI literacy: a first step — not an end in itself

Our AI literacy strand isn't a generic awareness programme: it starts from your organisation, your processes and your actual use cases. The aim isn't to fill a room — it's to give you and your teams the shared understanding needed to decide what to automate, what to hand over to AI, and what to keep under human oversight.

It's the first step of an engagement, not a final deliverable. What sets our approach apart: once the diagnostic and scoping workshops are complete, we're in a position to design the tool — the bespoke, AI-enhanced business application — if your context justifies it. Our support doesn't stop at the final recommendation.

02 — Audience

Who is this for?

01

SME/mid-sized company leaders

Who are planning a major digital project and want to make sure they're heading in the right direction before investing — including those who must meet the AI literacy obligation under the AI Act (Art. 4, in force since 02/02/2025).

02

IT managers

Who need an outside perspective on their architecture, technical debt, or unmanaged AI usage.

03

Local and regional authorities

Who are deploying or considering deploying AI systems and want to scope their project before launching a procurement process — deploying authorities are directly concerned by Art. 4 of the AI Act.

04

Organisations in transformation

Who need to prioritise their digital initiatives in a context of limited resources.

03 — Method

Our approach

Engagement
4 stages
From listening to actionable recommendations
01

Listening and immersion

A consulting engagement starts with understanding your organisation: sector, processes, constraints, the history of your existing tools, and past decisions. Where AI is involved, this phase includes identifying real-world usage — including any that was never formally decided. We don't arrive with a pre-packaged diagnosis.

02

Analysis and diagnosis

We analyse the concrete elements: source code, existing architecture, data flows, team structure, and available metrics. The diagnosis is factual, documented, and free of commercial bias.

03

Actionable recommendations

We deliver our findings as prioritised, actionable recommendations — not a theoretical report. Each recommendation comes with an effort estimate, a priority level, and an implementation approach.

04

Support for decision-making

We remain available after the presentation to help you weigh your options, answer questions from your internal stakeholders, or clarify specific points. Consulting doesn't stop at the delivery of the document.

04 — Outcomes

What it delivers

  • A clear view of what exists, with no blind spots.
  • Better-informed investment decisions, with less risk.
  • Solid project scoping that speeds up the development phase.
  • Prioritisation of initiatives that accounts for your real constraints.
  • A documented basis for regulatory compliance (GDPR, AI Act).
  • A shared understanding of AI within your processes — to make informed decisions before designing the bespoke, AI-enhanced business application.
05 — FAQ

Frequently asked questions

How is this consulting service different from a generalist consulting firm?
Our expertise is technical and operational: we build the very solutions we help design. Our advice is grounded in the reality of development — not theoretical frameworks. And we have no incentive to sell a packaged product: we help you find the right solution, whatever it may be.
Can we bring you in for a consulting engagement without committing to development afterwards?
Yes. The consulting engagement stands on its own. If it concludes that the best solution is an existing off-the-shelf package, in-house development, or another provider, we'll say so. Our objective is for you to make the right decision.
How long does an audit engagement take?
It depends on the complexity of what's already in place and the scope of the audit. A targeted audit (a single application, a single process) can be carried out in one to two weeks. A more comprehensive digital maturity audit typically runs three to six weeks. We scope the engagement with you before starting.
Can you help us assess the technical debt of a project taken over from a previous provider?
This is one of our most common use cases. We analyse the existing codebase and assess its maintainability, the risks involved, and the effort required to bring it up to standard or evolve it.
Do you work on projects involving AI?
Yes. Assessing existing or planned AI systems is part of our expertise: relevance of the use case, AI Act risk level, architecture choices, data sovereignty. See our Automation & AI service.
Does the AI Act require my company to train its staff on AI?
Yes, for deployers of AI systems: since 02/02/2025, Article 4 of the EU regulation on artificial intelligence (AI Act) requires every deployer to ensure a sufficient level of AI literacy among its staff. National penalties apply from 02/08/2026. What we offer isn't a standardised programme: it's a diagnostic of your actual usage, followed by scoping workshops grounded in your context, so you're equipped to decide. Source: entreprises.gouv.fr / DGE, EU Regulation 2024/1689, Art. 4.
What's the difference between your AI literacy work and a standard training course?
The difference is structural. A training provider starts from generic content and adapts it at the margins. We start from your processes, your data and your real use cases to build a shared understanding useful to your decision. And where a generic awareness session ends in a training room, our scoping engagement can lead on — if your context justifies it — to designing the bespoke, AI-enhanced business application. It's a first step towards a longer-term engagement, not a final deliverable.

To find out more

Our reference article on method and AI Act obligations: Scoping AI in your business processes: where to start.

For public authorities: The AI Act: what public authorities need to know.

Discover our complementary services: Bespoke business applications · Bespoke software · Automation & AI · Support & maintenance (TMA).

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Want an outside perspective before you commit — to understand why your current system isn't performing, or to scope your AI usage ahead of the August 2026 regulatory deadline?

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