Operations & Technology Consulting

Stephenson Holdings Group LLC

I help hardware-as-a-service companies — robotics, IoT, infrastructure, and mixed hardware-software businesses — scale from zero to fully enterprise-ready. From building professional services revenue from $0 to $7M, to scaling global fleets across 20+ countries, to deploying AI-powered operations automation, I bring the technical operations expertise and business operations discipline that comes from Amazon Robotics, Shopify, and Butlr. I started this consultancy because I genuinely enjoy helping companies grow and scale in the complex domains I've spent my career in.

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$0→$7M Revenue Built
$300M+ Portfolio Managed
20+ Countries
60+ Programs Delivered
100% On-Time Delivery
96% Fleet Uptime
01

About

I build the operational infrastructure that turns technical products into deployed, revenue-generating solutions.

Unlike traditional operations advisors who focus on efficiency and cost management, I create new revenue streams from zero. Most operations consultancies are either commercial leaders without technical depth or technical managers without P&L experience. I am both.

My expertise is built on hands-on experience building operations from zero at Amazon Robotics, scaling global fleets at Shopify, and growing professional services revenue to $7M at Butlr — managing $300M+ in deployments across 20+ countries. I bring the operational playbook, the financial discipline, and the cross-cultural leadership to help companies accelerate timelines, maximize ROI, and mitigate risk.

01

Zero-to-One

Built multiple organizations and revenue streams from scratch, including professional services from $0 to $7M.

02

Global Scale

Deployed operations across 20+ countries and 3 continents, building vendor ecosystems from the ground up.

03

P&L Ownership

Own full P&L for services organizations, board reporting, pricing strategy, and margin targets.

02

How I Work

Fractional COO

Embedded leadership for companies that need operational expertise but aren't ready for a full-time executive. I step in to build your operations function, establish vendor networks, create pricing and revenue models, and lead cross-functional teams — then transition to an advisory role as you hire permanent leadership.

Project-Based

Scoped engagements with clear deliverables and timelines. Typical projects include zero-to-one operations builds, global rollout planning, professional services monetization, pricing strategy overhauls, vendor ecosystem design, or crisis prevention planning.

Retainer

Ongoing advisory support for leadership teams navigating growth, scaling, or operational complexity. I serve as a sounding board for strategic decisions, review board materials, audit vendor relationships, and provide on-call expertise when critical issues arise.

Advisory Board

Formal advisory role for companies in robotics, IoT, hardware-as-a-service, or mixed hardware-software businesses. I bring the perspective of someone who has built and scaled operations at the companies you're trying to emulate — Amazon, Shopify, and beyond.

03

Services

Business Strategy & Operational Excellence

  • Strategic planning and operational transformations
  • Gap analyses and remediation planning
  • Due diligence and technical review
  • Process optimization and lean implementation
  • Operational maturity assessment

Operations & Deployment Strategy

  • Zero-to-one build and launch planning
  • Vendor ecosystem development
  • Global rollout and multi-site deployment
  • Brownfield and live operations integration
  • Supply chain and logistics design

Program Management Office (PMO)

  • PMO design and governance frameworks
  • Multi-site program coordination
  • Critical path and risk management
  • Project portfolio management
  • Cross-functional stakeholder alignment

Professional Services & Revenue Operations

  • Pricing strategy and revenue recognition
  • Service monetization and packaging
  • Deal desk and quoting infrastructure
  • Margin expansion and cost optimization
  • Board reporting and financial governance

Fleet & Field Operations

  • Maintenance network design
  • SLA development and management
  • Fleet uptime optimization
  • Vendor-managed field service models
  • Preventative maintenance programs

Program Management & Strategic Advisory

  • Roadmap development and requirements decomposition
  • Agile transformation and execution coaching
  • Product-market fit and GTM alignment
  • Change management and org design
  • Executive stakeholder communication
04

Areas of Expertise

Business & Revenue

P&L Ownership Pricing Strategy Deal Desk Automation Revenue Operations Margin Expansion Board Reporting Go-to-Market Strategy

Operations & Scale

Zero-to-One Build Global Delivery Vendor Ecosystems Fleet Operations Field Service Design Brownfield Deployment Crisis Prevention

Leadership & AI

PMO Development Org Design Cross-Functional Leadership Change Management AI-Powered Operations Document Intelligence Workflow Automation
05

Case Studies

Zero-to-One Butlr Technology

From $0 to 55% Revenue — Building Professional Services from Nothing

Situation

Butlr had no professional services function when I joined. The company sold IoT sensors but relied on customers or internal teams to handle installation. There was no revenue stream for professional services, no partner network, no pricing model, and no delivery infrastructure.

Task

Build an entire professional services organization from zero — pricing, tools, partners, team, legal frameworks — and grow it into a revenue-generating engine.

Action

Converted the original team of Field Application Engineers into Project Managers, built a formal PMO, then evolved it to include an embedded DevOps organization. Established 3 strategic global partner networks, built automated quoting and deal desk tools, restructured legal frameworks, created installation QA tooling, and deployed remote fleet management capabilities.

Result

Grew professional services from $0 to ~$7MM annually in 18 months. Professional services now accounts for 55% of Butlr's total revenue. Mean Time to Revenue dropped from 4-6 months to 30 days. Built a scalable, repeatable delivery model across USA, Canada, EU, Australia, and Japan.

Scaling Shopify / 6 River Systems

Scaling 2X While Cutting Costs 20% and Improving Quality

Situation

Shopify was growing 2X year-over-year, deploying more robots to more fulfillment centers. Typically, growth means higher costs, longer repair times, and declining quality.

Task

Scale maintenance operations to support 2X growth across 11 countries while simultaneously reducing costs and improving quality.

Action

Led a strategic pivot from traveling SREs to a vendor-managed contractor model. Onboarded global break-fix and preventative maintenance vendors. Transitioned SREs to work-from-home roles managing contractors remotely. Built training and preventative maintenance programs. Shifted 50% of workload from reactive to proactive.

Result

Reduced Mean Time to Repair from 30-45 days to 9 days. Reduced costs 20% YoY. Maintained 96% fleet uptime. All achieved with only 1 direct employee. Recognized as Top 1% of High-Impact Employees across all of Shopify.

Crisis Prevention Shopify / 6 River Systems

Peak Season Mastery — Turning the Most Stressful Time Into a Non-Event

Situation

In ecommerce, the holiday shopping season ('Peak') is make-or-break for fulfillment companies. If automation breaks down during customers' most critical time, it's catastrophic. Competitors typically fly their entire leadership teams on-site to support operations during Peak.

Task

Ensure Peak ran smoothly across thousands of robots in 11 countries without the chaos, without flying teams on-site, and without any customer disruptions.

Action

Planned months ahead: completed all preventative maintenance and repairs the month before Peak. Coordinated on-call technicians for every customer during Peak. Staged critical components at strategic locations for next-day repairs. Built the vendor network that could respond quickly and efficiently.

Result

Peak ran so smoothly that the entire company noted how 'eerily' calm it was. When robots did break down, they were fixed quickly and efficiently through the vendor network. Zero disruptions during the most critical period.

Zero-to-One Amazon Robotics

Building Amazon's Robotics Playbook — From Kiva Acquisition to Global Scale

Situation

Amazon acquired Kiva Systems and needed to figure out how to deploy warehouse robotics at massive scale. There was no playbook, no methodology, no established process.

Task

Join the original cohort, build the first three Kiva robotic warehouses, and establish the processes, standards, and methodologies that Amazon Robotics would scale globally.

Action

Served as PM/Engineer at Amazon's R&D testing facility — received first shipments of new robots, hardware, and systems. Tested, provided feedback, and helped figure out deployment methodology. Progressed to Lead, consistently given the toughest projects. Eventually spearheaded international expansion to UK and Spain.

Result

Helped build the blueprint Amazon Robotics used to scale globally. Managed $300M+ in deployment projects across 3 countries. Led teams of 20-50 contractors with small core engineering teams. The processes built are still replicated across hundreds of facilities worldwide.

Scaling Amazon Robotics

Weekend-Only Brownfield Transitions — 50% Larger Building in 2 Days

Situation

Amazon needed to convert existing live warehouses into robotic facilities without significant downtime. Previous attempts took a full week with massive resources.

Task

Design a transition process that would shut down buildings for only a weekend regardless of size, while maintaining operational continuity.

Action

Developed a custom Microsoft Access database and application workflow to stage data for transition, enabling the software team to queue and switch all data during the physical transition. Eliminated the need for on-site scanning during the transition window. Designed the entire physical transition plan around a weekend shutdown.

Result

Transitioned a building 50% larger with fewer people in 2 days instead of a week. Eliminated the week-long shutdowns. Defined the process that became the standard for multiple other sites.

Zero-to-One Butlr Technology

Remote Installations as a Competitive Moat

Situation

All device configuration at Butlr was previously done on physical device touchscreens in the factory, creating a manufacturing bottleneck. Customers could only install on-site, and competitors also required physical presence.

Task

Eliminate the factory bottleneck and enable remote device configuration to unlock a new business model that competitors couldn't match.

Action

Developed and deployed a tool that moved device pairing from the factory floor to on-site or fully remote. Built fleet management tooling that allowed SSH access to devices, remote firmware updates, and remote configuration.

Result

Cleared a 4-month supply chain backlog overnight. Enabled remote installations, allowing customers to start small and scale. Transformed Butlr's competitive positioning and opened new go-to-market options.

AI & Automation Butlr Technology

AI-Driven Legal Transformation — From 3 Agreements + 11 SOWs to 1 Scalable Framework

Situation

Butlr had 3 separate customer agreements (SaaS, CapEx, Butlr Care) and 11 different SOWs for professional services. The strategy was to keep creating new agreements for every new vertical. Legal documents were scattered, inconsistent, and the sales team had to navigate a maze of paperwork. The senior care vertical launch was stalled because no legal framework existed for it.

Task

Consolidate the fragmented legal framework into a single scalable system that could accommodate any new vertical without creating new agreements each time.

Action

Built a repository of legal documents with markdown agent files using AI coding agents. Mapped relationships between all documents — how MSAs relate to SOWs, how exhibits attach, how standard language varies across vendor and customer contracts. Created agent skills that understand these relationships to build a cohesive legal framework. Consolidated 3 agreements into 1 with scalable exhibits. Reduced 11 SOWs to 1. Integrated legal references into the sales order process as two simple URLs. Then applied the same methodology to vendor onboarding and vendor legal documents, building cross-referencing for MSA analysis against standard language.

Result

Single customer agreement with exhibits now scales to any new vertical — senior care launched seamlessly as proof. SOWs cut from 11 to 1. MSA analysis against standard and vendor language saves 30% time. Backend legal language is now scalable and updatable. The same document intelligence approach is being applied to vendor onboarding.

AI & Automation Butlr Technology

From 720+ Pricing Combinations to Instant Self-Service Quoting with AI Workflows

Situation

Butlr's professional services pricing was a mess: 720+ combinations across 12 Google Sheets rate cards. Sales team manually calculated quotes, which took weeks, had high error rates, and offered no visibility into deal health. Management couldn't tell if a deal was good or bad until it was already signed.

Task

Automate the entire quoting process so sales could generate accurate quotes instantly, while giving leadership real-time deal health visibility with automated approval routing.

Action

Built a repository with pricing logic and created skills using AI coding agents. Automated all professional service pricing into a standard calculator with toggles and settings. Integrated a deal health scorecard into the sales order process that grades deals across multiple metrics. Built auto-approval for healthy deals under defined conditions, and intelligent routing with specific guidance for unhealthy deals. Transformed quote creation from a multi-week manual process into an instant self-service workflow.

Result

Sales team now generates accurate quotes instantly for any service offering. System immediately flags deal health or spells out exactly what needs to change for auto-approval. Butlr stands behind every quote. Streamlined quoting improved margins and eliminated manual rate card references. Single-handedly gave Butlr the ability to monitor, approve, and focus on healthy deals.

AI & Automation Butlr Technology

Building an Enterprise Field Service Scheduling Platform in Go + AWS from Scratch

Situation

Butlr coordinated IoT installations across 20+ countries via email chains. PMs manually scheduled multi-day install projects, managed vendor assignments through spreadsheets, and tracked invoicing in disparate systems. There was no central visibility into resource constraints, project conflicts, or customer communication.

Task

Build a field service scheduling platform that replaces email-based coordination with automated booking, resource management, vendor visibility, invoicing integration, and automated customer communication — deployed globally.

Action

Originally prototyped in Python, then refactored to Go for performance and maintainability. Self-deployed before Butlr integration to learn the full stack end-to-end. Architecture: Go backend on AWS ECS, PostgreSQL RDS database, static HTML frontend served from S3, Auth0 authentication, GitHub Actions CI/CD. Built automated booking links for multi-day install projects. Added resource constraint management to prevent double-booking. Created vendor assignment visibility so partners see their projects. Integrated invoicing workflows. Added Google Calendar subscriptions for company-wide visibility. Automated customer email workflows for booking, confirmation, and updates.

Result

Replaced email-based project coordination across 20+ countries. Vendors manage their own projects and invoicing through the platform. Customer communication is fully automated. Company has real-time visibility into global install scheduling. Platform handles resource constraints and prevents conflicts. Built entirely in-house with Go + AWS cloud-native architecture — no SaaS vendor dependency.

06

What Clients Say

Brian has great business acumen, a rare quality in functional leaders at our current scope and size. Being able to recognize, differentiate, and communicate across the board on what we can do and what we should do in the future — is a great ability for great leadership.

Zixiao Pan President, Butlr Technology

Within 6 months, Brian transformed Butlr's technical operations — elevating service quality, consistency, and scalability to a whole new level. Setting up the multi-tiered, well-trained vendor network so rapidly at such high quality was THE reason Butlr was able to deliver our heavy targets in Q3 and Q4 without breaking.

Zixiao Pan President, Butlr Technology

Brian's ability to run the international robotic maintenance program has been an incredible boon to our customers during peak. Our hardware team has worked so hard to improve our customer experience, and it's paying dividends with our customer satisfaction.

Matthew Leitch Chief of Staff, 6 River Systems (Shopify)

Brian is conscientious about company-level strategy and not limited by the function he owns. This helps him drive decision-making in the context of the broader company. A great trait for senior leaders.

Zixiao Pan President, Butlr Technology

The TO team adores and respects Brian and follows his leadership and direction with great loyalty. Brian's leadership is one of the key reasons we have a stable and highly functional team.

Zixiao Pan President, Butlr Technology

As a team leader, Brian demonstrated deep hands-on experience, strategic thinking, and strong execution ability. He was good at providing strategic clarity and setting context for his team, such that team members could internalize and buy in from the get-go.

Zixiao Pan President, Butlr Technology
07

Organizations I've Worked With

08

Get in Touch

I'd welcome the opportunity to learn about your organization and technology, and to partner with you in optimizing designs, accelerating timelines, maximizing ROI, and reducing risk.

Email brian@stephensongroup.org
Location Mooresville, NC
LinkedIn linkedin.com/in/stebrian