Engagement stages

RiverBase engagements follow a repeatable sequence so clients know when decisions are needed and when code lands in their repositories. Stages flex in length; they do not get skipped.

Discovery call

Thirty to sixty minutes to confirm sources, warehouse platform, failure history, and whether the right offer is an audit, design pack, handover pairing, or full ETL Pipeline Engagement. No preparation deck required — bring recent job names and one painful incident.

Access & inventory

Read-only access to job definitions, logs, and warehouse schemas. We produce a short inventory of extracts and loads before recommending a quote or fixed audit fee.

Design decisions

Grain, keys, load windows, and ownership between vendor feeds and internal transforms are written down and approved by your technical counterpart. Implementation does not start on undecided schemas.

Build sprints

Paired coding in your repositories. Daily or thrice-weekly check-ins depending on engagement size. Staging validation lands before production cutover is scheduled.

Cutover & runbook

Rehearsal load, production cutover, and a runbook covering restart, backfill, and escalation. We remain available for the agreed hypercare window — typically the first thirty nights for flagship engagements.

When stages shorten

A Pipeline Health Audit stops after inventory and findings. Warehouse Load Design stops after design decisions and the written pack. Handover Pairing emphasises build-adjacent walkthroughs and runbook pages rather than greenfield design.

Next action