Mossbrook Data Partners / BG-Demo – Onboarding
Callcompleted
Mossbrook Data Partners · 22 Sep 2025 15:45
On 22 Sep 2025, Ciaran Doherty confirmed the Snowflake set-up was sound but nothing had loaded, three weeks into a four-week Starter implementation. Connector choice, a single admin and slow progress are the issues. The £20k price was confirmed.
What was said
What this says
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026On 22 Sep 2025, Ciaran Doherty confirmed the Snowflake set-up was sound but nothing had loaded, three weeks into a four-week Starter implementation. Connector choice, a single admin and slow progress are the issues. The £20k price was confirmed.
What happened: Ciaran checked the logs and found the database, schemas and service role in place but zero rows loaded. He accepted the delay was Mossbrook's: two client migrations landed on top of the work.
Customer view: Starter's hard limit of four connectors is tight against five wanted sources. He would drop finance and start with CRM, helpdesk, call recorder and shared drive, and he will only roll out once the data is trustworthy.
Commercial: Ciaran asked Hamza Akhtar to confirm £20k a year for his finance lead, and Hamza said it matches the order form and the invoices. Sophie Ling and Marcus Bell have both said Mossbrook is the first partner doing referred set-ups, so this account sets a pattern.
Watch: Ciaran is the only admin and agreed to nominate a second before connectors go on. The evidence does not show a name, and no data had loaded.
Themes
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026Theme
Starter onboarding delay
Importance
neutral
Sentiment
neutral
Voice
champion
Who was there
BG-Demo
CRMmade from
Them
CRMmade from
Follow-up
Next steps
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Hamza Akhtar to send the grants script and the one-page connector template the day after the call.
- Ciaran to nominate a second admin and create read-only API users before the connectors go on.
- Hamza and Ciaran to configure the CRM connector together on the Tuesday call at half past three.
Risks
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- Nothing had loaded three weeks into a four-week Starter implementation, so first value is late.
- Ciaran is the only admin, and the second admin was not yet named.
- Four connectors is a hard limit against five wanted sources, so finance and mailboxes are left out.
Opportunities
As at Fri 9 Oct 2026- More connectors, by add-on or a move to Growth, if Mossbrook outgrows the four it has.
- A successful internal set-up could become the pattern for referred client set-ups.
Transcript
Hamza AkhtarHi Ciaran, can you hear me all right?
Ciaran DohertyYep. Afternoon. Bit of an echo, hang on. Better?- Hamza AkhtarMuch better, thanks. Afternoon. Good of you to make time, I know it's a busy start to the week.
- Ciaran DohertyIt's Monday. They're all busy. Before we start, I'll tell you what I found in the logs, if that's all right.
- Hamza AkhtarPlease. That's what I was hoping you'd say.
- Ciaran DohertyI went through the query history this morning. The B-Viz database is there, the schemas are there, the service role you set up is there. I checked the role grants and they're tighter than I expected, which is good. But nothing has loaded. Zero rows in the landing schema. Which warehouse is that running on, by the way? I can see it's the extra small one, I just want to know if that's yours or mine.
- Hamza AkhtarThat one's from the install, so it's the default we create inside your account. You can resize it whenever you like. I'd leave it small until we see what the first full load costs you.
- Ciaran DohertyFine. I'll put a resource monitor on it anyway. I don't like anything running without a ceiling.
- Hamza AkhtarCompletely sensible. And you're right that nothing has loaded, that's really what today is about. We've done the Snowflake side, so now it's the connectors and who owns what.
- Ciaran DohertyGo on then. How many connectors do we get?
- Hamza AkhtarFour. On Starter that's a hard limit, so it's worth choosing carefully. Users are fifteen, and that one's soft, so nobody's going to be locked out if you go over a bit. But four sources is four sources.
- Ciaran DohertyRight. That's tight, to be honest. We've got the CRM, the helpdesk, the call recorder, the shared drive, and the mailboxes. That's five. And finance, if anyone's being ambitious.
- Hamza AkhtarYeah, that's the usual squeeze. What would you lose least by leaving out?
- Ciaran DohertyFinance. Definitely finance. For our own client base the question is always who is working on what, what did we promise them, what broke. That's CRM, calls, tickets. The mailboxes are noisy and I'd rather not pull them in blind.
- Hamza AkhtarSo CRM, the call recorder, the helpdesk and the shared drive. Four. Is that the order you'd want them in?
- Ciaran DohertyCRM first, because everything else hangs off the account record. Then the helpdesk. Then calls. Drive last, it's the messy one.
- Hamza AkhtarAgreed. I'd do the same. The drive is where people keep things in folders called final and then final again.
- Ciaran DohertyHa. Yes. That's a schema question as much as anything. Half of it won't have a consistent owner.
- Hamza AkhtarWhich is partly why I wanted you on the call rather than someone more junior, no offence to anyone. You're the person who'll know what is safe to expose.
- Ciaran DohertyNone taken. I'm the only admin at the moment, as you know. That's not ideal, but it's what we've got.
- Hamza AkhtarCan I push on that a little? If you're away, or you're on a client site for a week, nobody can approve a connector change. I'd put a second admin in, one of your senior engineers. It costs nothing and it saves you a bad day.
- Ciaran DohertyHm. I've been avoiding that, if I'm honest, because then I have to explain the role model twice. But yes. I'll nominate someone. Probably the person who looks after our internal warehouse.
- Hamza AkhtarThat works. Don't need a name today, just before we switch the connectors on.
- Ciaran DohertyNoted. Now, roles. This is the bit I care about most. I want one read-only role per source, nothing shared, and the B-Viz service role should only see what the connector lands. No access to our production client schemas, ever.
- Hamza AkhtarThat's how it's built. The service role only has usage on its own database and the warehouse. Where I'd want your eyes is the source side: the credentials each connector uses in the CRM and the helpdesk. Those are the ones that need to be least-privilege on that side too.
- Ciaran DohertyRight, and that's where people get lazy. They hand over an admin token because it's quicker. I'll create dedicated API users with read scope only. I want that documented, who created it, when, what it can touch.
- Hamza AkhtarI'll give you a template for that. One page per connector, so you've got a record you can keep after we've gone. That's the documentation side of the handover.
- Ciaran DohertyGood. Because clients ask. When we eventually set this up for one of ours, I'm not going to be inventing a format on the day.
- Hamza AkhtarYes, and that's a nice point to touch on. Sophie Ling and Marcus Bell have both mentioned that you're the first partner who'll be doing referred set-ups. So whatever we do for your own account becomes the pattern.
- Ciaran DohertyI know. Which is why I'd rather it was slow and right. I'm not interested in a quick demo that falls over when we put a real client in it.
- Hamza AkhtarFair. Let me be honest about timing, then. The plan for Starter is four weeks from signing, and you signed on 29 Aug 2025. So on paper we're close to the end of it, and nothing has loaded. I don't want to pretend otherwise.
- Ciaran DohertyI wasn't going to let you. I did the Snowflake work in the first week and then it sat with me. Two client migrations landed on top of it. That's on us, not you.
- Hamza AkhtarAppreciated. So what's realistic? If you create the read-only users this week, I can have the CRM connector configured shortly after, and we'd see the first full refresh before the end of next week.
- Ciaran DohertyDefine shortly.
- Hamza AkhtarSame day you give me the credentials, assuming they work. Ideally we do it together on a call, with you on the screen.
- Ciaran DohertyTogether is the only way I'll do it. I don't grant roles by email and I don't paste secrets into a chat. You tell me what the role needs, I run it, you watch.
- Hamza AkhtarThat's exactly how I'd want it. I'll send you the grants as a script to review beforehand, you read it, change what you don't like, and you run it yourself in the session.
- Ciaran DohertyGood. When? Not Friday. I don't touch a production account on a Friday.
- Hamza AkhtarWouldn't dream of it. How about Tuesday, afternoon again? Same time as today?
- Ciaran DohertyTuesday works. Make it a bit earlier, I've got a client call at five. Half past three.
- Hamza AkhtarHalf past three, done. I'll send the invite after this.
- Ciaran DohertyOne thing on the commercial side, while I remember. Our finance lead asked me to confirm the amount before the next invoice run. I was told £19,500 a year for the Starter subscription. Is that what you have?
- Hamza AkhtarThat matches the order form, £19,500 a year, and it matches what's been invoiced. Nothing overdue on our side either. If your finance lead has a query, Sophie Ling is the person for terms.
- Ciaran DohertyGood. That's all they wanted. I'll tell them.
- Hamza AkhtarAnd once you're live, Marcus Bell takes over as your customer success contact. On Starter that's a check-in every six months rather than quarterly reviews, but he'll watch adoption in between.
- Ciaran DohertyFine by me. I'd rather they left us alone and the thing worked.
- Hamza AkhtarHa, understood. Last bit from me: users. You've got fifteen. Who do you actually expect to be on it in the first month?
- Ciaran DohertyMe. The second admin. Maybe three or four engineers who handle client escalations. The account managers will want it once they see it, but I'm not rolling it out to everyone until the data's trustworthy. If it gives a wrong answer in week one, nobody will ever come back.
- Hamza AkhtarThat's a wise instinct. Start with a small group who'll tell you when something looks off, then widen. I can walk the first few through the chat and search side when you're ready.
- Ciaran DohertyDo that after the first refresh, not before. Nobody wants a tour of an empty database.
- Hamza AkhtarFair point. Right, let me play back what I've got, because I'd hate to get it wrong. You nominate a second admin before the connectors go on. You create read-only API users for the CRM, helpdesk, call recorder and shared drive, in that order. I send the grants script and the one-page template by tomorrow. We meet Tuesday at half past three, and you run everything yourself while I watch.
- Ciaran DohertyAnd a resource monitor on the warehouse. And you send me the handover document once the first load is in.
- Hamza AkhtarBoth on the list. Anything else I should know before we finish? Anything in the logs that worried you?
- Ciaran DohertyOne thing. The ticket I raised last week, about the permissions page being out of date. I got an answer, it was fine. But that page should say which scopes are needed per source. I had to work it out myself.
- Hamza AkhtarUseful, thank you. I'll feed that back to the team that owns the docs. In the meantime the template I'm sending will list the scopes per connector, so you won't need to guess.
- Ciaran DohertyI don't guess. But thanks.
- Hamza AkhtarI know, I know. Poor choice of words. Right, I'll let you get back to your Monday. Thanks, Ciaran.
- Ciaran DohertyCheers. Speak Tuesday. Ciaran.
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