Managed operations

What I keep running, and how.

After a build is finished, someone has to keep it alive. Jobs fail, vendors change their systems, credentials expire, and documentation drifts. This page explains what I manage, where your data lives, who holds the keys, how you reach me, and how an exit works.

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What I Manage

Seven kinds of work

Managed work is the agreement for keeping what was built running. It can cover seven kinds of work. Your written service list says which of them apply to you.

Automation. Scheduled jobs and triggers kept running, and repaired when they break.
Reporting. Recurring reports and dashboards kept accurate as the operation changes.
Integrations. The connections between your systems watched, and repaired when one degrades.
Documentation. Inventories, runbooks, and ownership records kept matching what is actually running.
Monitoring. Every critical job has a visible success or failure state. A job that can fail silently is not monitored.
Release and change maintenance. Controlled changes to what is already there, each with a record and a way back.
Support coordination. Requests logged, triaged, and tracked to close, including work with the right vendor when the problem sits on their side.

Every managed engagement starts with a written service boundary: which systems are covered, which are not, how requests reach me, who approves changes, and what happens at exit. If a system is not on that list, it is not managed, even if I built it.

Not included by default

New automation and new features. Building something new is quoted as separate work, not absorbed into the monthly fee.
A full IT help desk, or support for every device and network in the company.
Legal advice, or representation in front of a regulator.
After-hours or on-call coverage that is not written into your agreement.

Security and Boundaries

Your records stay in your account

The short version: your data stays in the systems that own it, and those systems stay in your name.

Your systems of record live in your own Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 account. I work in them as an invited administrator, and you can remove that access at any time.
I do not host your records by default. If hosting something for you is ever the only workable option, it is a written exception with an end date and a plan to move it back into your account.
Each client gets a separate environment. No shared credentials, no shared folders that hold client data, and no copying one client's records into another client's environment, test environments included.
Least privilege. Access is scoped to the work, reviewed on a schedule, and removed when it is no longer needed.
Anything that runs on a schedule runs under a managed service identity, never under a person's login.
No secrets in logs, tickets, AI prompts, or documentation. I record who has access to what, never what the password is.
The managed environment, which I call the Forward Operating Base, tracks status, ownership, and evidence about your systems. It is not a data warehouse. It shows that a job ran, when it last succeeded, and who owns it, while the records stay in your systems.

Two kinds of automation

Every automation I build or manage falls into one of two classes, and you can see which is which.

Tools your staff run

Menu-driven tools your own people start when they need them. They have no scheduled triggers, and if I leave, they keep working unchanged.

Services I manage

Scheduled pulls, monitoring, health checks, and report generation. They run on my service identity and stop when the engagement ends.

Every automation is listed, with its class, in a register you can see.

Keys, Connections, and AI

You own the keys

You own every API key and app credential. Each one is created in your own vendor account and stored in your own Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 account.
If a connection runs through an app that True North Data Strategies owns, that connection ends when the engagement ends. Anything meant to outlast the engagement is set up under your accounts.
Live data connections and AI features are supported only under a managed tier. Without one, a repair is quoted as new work.
AI features run on your own AI provider account, billed to you directly by the provider, or on a private server on hardware you own. I never front, pay for, or mark up AI usage.
Downloaded templates and tools carry no live connections.

Client Access

How you reach me

Sign-in to the client view is by invitation, and it comes when a retained client needs it. There is no public sign-up, and everyone who gets access signs in as themselves.

Until then, support runs through one logged channel, named in your agreement, with a stated business-hours response window. A response means I acknowledge the request and triage it within that window. It does not mean the fix is finished inside it.

If you lose access

Start with your own administrator. Your Google Workspace or Microsoft 365 account is yours, and your administrator controls it.
Then contact me through your support channel or the contact page. I cannot restore access for someone I cannot verify, so recovery goes through your administrator or the contact your agreement names.
I will never ask for your password, and I will never ask you to send a credential by email, text, or chat. If a message claiming to be from me asks for one, it is not from me. Forward it to me and do not reply.
When someone leaves your company, tell me the same day so their access comes off.

Exit and Data Rights

A clean handoff

I would rather you stay because the service is worth paying for. Making it painful to leave is not a business model I want to run.

What you get

Your business data in documented formats: CSV or JSON for structured data, PDF where a readable record is the point, and native or open formats for documents.
The current list of managed systems, the automation register, the runbooks, and the open items.
Exports checked for readability and completeness before they are handed over.

What stays with True North Data Strategies

Reusable platform elements stay True North Data Strategies property unless your contract says otherwise: libraries, templates, methods, and deployment tooling. A contractor leaves the building and takes the tools.

The transition is documented step by step, with a named owner on each side.
After handoff, my access is revoked, the services I run are shut down, and every credential I touched is rotated.
I never use access as leverage in a billing dispute.

Because your records stay in your own account, an exit is a handover, not a rescue. Notice periods, transition hours, and which specific assets transfer are set in your agreement, and the agreement is what binds.

Pick the Level of Support

Three managed tiers

The tier is set by how much there is to keep running. Every tier starts with the same written service boundary.

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