Frequently asked questions

Most engagements start with a short conversation about what is actually breaking or what you are trying to build. From there, the usual first step is a Technology Assessment: a focused review that produces clear findings and a path forward. If the problem is already well understood, we can move straight to scoped project work instead.

An assessment is a focused review of a system, workflow, data problem, or infrastructure concern, usually one to three weeks, that ends with practical findings and recommendations. You do not always need one. It is most useful when you know something is wrong but not yet where the root cause lives. When the problem is already clear, we can skip straight to project work.

Work is scoped to the engagement model. Assessments are fixed-scope and time-boxed, typically one to three weeks. Project work is milestone-based against defined outcomes. Retained engineering is billed monthly. Pricing depends on scope and is discussed directly before any work starts, so there are no surprise invoices.

Three. Technology Assessments are a focused review with findings and recommendations. Project Work covers scoped builds and remediation with defined outcomes, billed by milestone. Retained Engineering is ongoing development, integration, data, or technical-leadership support billed monthly, for when the work is broader than a single project.

Northwerk is a founder-led consultancy run by Cody King. The person you talk to is the person doing the work, with no account managers or junior hand-offs. That keeps communication direct and means the engineer understands your environment end to end.

Both. Northwerk is based in Marshfield, in Central Wisconsin, and serves businesses in the region as well as clients further out. Most work is done remotely, with on-site time where it genuinely helps, such as during infrastructure cutovers or multi-site integration work.

Founder-led delivery on every project, and a span that runs from the server rack to the source code: infrastructure, custom software, ERP and data integration, and reporting. The goal is the root cause and a working system, not a polished presentation or a ticket queue.

Data location and access boundaries are treated as part of the design, not an afterthought. For sensitive work, including AI use cases, Northwerk plans around approved data sources, access control, and local, on-prem, or hybrid deployment so information is not copied into systems it should not be in.

Yes. Infrastructure work covers cloud, on-prem, and hybrid environments, and AI-readiness work specifically includes local or controlled deployment planning when data should stay inside your environment. The right answer depends on your constraints, which is part of what an assessment establishes.

Common tools include React, Next.js, .NET, Rust, SQL Server and T-SQL, Python, SSRS and Power BI for reporting, EDI and REST APIs for integration, and Azure, AWS, Active Directory, and M365 on the infrastructure side. The stack is chosen to fit the systems you already run, not the other way around.

Services are direct engineering work scoped to your business: assessments, builds, integration, reporting, and infrastructure. Products, the Northwerk Platform and Northwerk Templates, are reusable software that grew out of that consulting work. Many engagements are purely services; some inform or connect to the products, but a product purchase is rarely the required first step.