Published with client sign-off

Case Studies

Each fractional CTO case study here shows what an engagement actually produces: a modernization path the team can walk on its own, a lower cost of building software, and releases that keep arriving. Detailed numbers go up only after the client signs off on them, so this page grows slowly.

Start with the $5,000 auditPrefer to talk first? Book a free intro call

Oleg Sotnikov structures every fractional CTO engagement around outcomes the client can measure: a fixed-price Team & AI Audit that puts numbers on team cost, delivery speed, and infrastructure spend, then a prioritized plan, then execution against it. The audit runs five business days for $5,000 and carries a published savings guarantee, so what you get first is a commitment with a figure attached rather than a proposal. The case studies below are written in the same order: the situation, the work, the result.

Case study

QueueStone: modernizing an ERP platform for mental-health providers

Advisory work on the architecture of the platform and on how the team built it. Those two are harder to separate than most modernization plans admit.

Client: QueueStone
Role: Strategic technology consultant
Focus: AI integrationEngineering operationsCost optimization

The client

QueueStone runs an ERP platform for mental-health providers — the software a practice depends on to keep its day-to-day operations moving. Systems in that position get judged on reliability before anything else, which is exactly what makes them hard to modernize.

The challenge

The platform had to move forward while it stayed in daily use. Development and QA cost set the ceiling on how much modernization was affordable, and release cadence set the pace at which any of it reached users. Pushing on one of those normally costs you the other.

What I did

AI in the delivery lifecycle

I introduced AI tools into the software delivery lifecycle, chosen for the work the team did every day rather than for what demos well. Adoption is a process question first: which step of the workflow the tool sits in, and who stays accountable for what it produces.

Development and QA cost

I brought the cost of building and testing down directly, rather than by moving the work somewhere cheaper and calling that a saving. Most of that cost sits in rework and waiting, which is why removing it also shortens the path to a release.

How the team runs

I reworked the team's process around what actually stalls delivery: how work gets sized, who decides, and what a change goes through before it reaches users.

The outcome

Releases came faster, and nothing was burned to get there. The cadence did not come from a bigger team, a bigger bill, or a stretch of overtime someone would have paid for later.

“Oleg Sotnikov was a great support to our team as Fractional CTO. He helped us shape the architecture of an ERP system for a mental health clinic and stayed involved throughout the development process, helping us make better and more efficient decisions. We truly appreciate his contribution.”

David Cohen · QueueStone

How an engagement starts

Every case starts as an audit. Five business days, a fixed price, and a plan your team can pick up the following week.

Audit

$5,000 fixed, five business days. I go through the team, the delivery process, the architecture, and the cloud and LLM bills, then put an annual dollar figure on each problem I find.

Plan

A prioritized plan: what to change, in what order, what the change costs, and what it returns. Written for your team to execute without me.

Execution

Your team runs the plan, or I stay on as fractional CTO and run it with them. Month to month, cancel anytime.

At least $50,000/year in identified savings — payroll, cloud, and LLM bills — or the audit is free.

See what the audit covers

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you measure results?

In the audit, before any work starts. We agree which numbers we are moving (payroll and delivery cost, release frequency, cycle time, cloud and LLM spend) and where each one stands today. Everything afterwards is measured against that baseline, which is also what makes the savings guarantee checkable rather than rhetorical.

Can I talk to a reference?

Yes, during the engagement conversation. I make introductions on request once I know which of my past engagements actually resembles your situation. There is no public reference list, because most clients would rather be asked first.

Will my company be featured as a case study?

Only if you sign off on it. Nothing appears on this page until the client has read the text, and I anonymize the company on request. The work and the result are usually the interesting part anyway, not the logo.

Why is only one case study published here?

Most of my work sits under NDA, and one approved case is worth more than a page of vague summaries. More will appear as engagements close and clients agree on what can be shown, including the numbers.

Tell me what you are trying to fix

Thirty minutes, no deck. If your situation resembles work I have done before, I will tell you how it went and where it did not go to plan.

Book a free intro call

Free, no obligation. I work in English and Russian.