Office hours: borrow a brain for 60 minutes
Stuck on delivery, architecture, or AI? Talk it through with engineers who’ve helped teams at Atlassian, Westpac and Koala
Bring your challenge as-is. We’ll tell you what we’d prioritise, what we’d stop doing, and how we’d approach it in a world where AI is changing how software gets built.
Free. 5 spots open monthly.
Book a second opinionCompanies we’ve helped
When AI changes how you build, who do you ask?
AI-assisted development made teams faster, but most organisations stopped at the velocity gains. They ignored the mounting debt: code nobody fully understands, weaker review cultures, and blind architectural tradeoffs.
If you’re not sure whether your team is falling into this trap, we can give you an honest read based on what we’ve seen inside companies like Atlassian, Westpac, Airwallex, and the Australian Government.
What you’ll get
Judgement from engineers who’ve been here before
We’ll share what works in cases like yours, and help you protect the critical path by calling out what can wait.
A picture of what “good” actually looks like
Most teams don’t have a reference point for what great engineering looks like in practice. We’ll show you the standards, patterns and trade-offs we look for.
Advice for the next step we’d take in your position
You’ll leave knowing what we’d prioritise first if we were in your position. After the call, we will follow up with any additional thoughts on how we’d approach the challenge.
Free. 5 spots open monthly.
Book a second opinionThinkmill helped our design and engineering people discover new ways of working together. We now ship faster, deliver better outcomes, and have more fun doing it.
Luke Kerr
Principal Program Manager, ELMO
Conversations we’re having with teams like yours
How can AI help our teams work better across functions to drive better outcomes?
Engineering is deep into AI workflows while design is catching up. We’ll talk through where that’s working, and where it isn’t.
Where AI speeds you up, and where it slows you down
Everyone wants more for less and faster right now. You’ll leave with our read on what’s realistic, what’s hype, and where we’d focus first.
If AI can design, why do I need a design system?
Without constraints, AI makes dozens of micro-decisions with every generation. We’ll tell you whether your design system is set up to make those decisions for it or leaving them up for grabs.
Context optimisation for the agentic era
We’ve spent 10+ years architecting systems and tools based on schema-led engineering, and a single source of truth. Turns out that’s exactly what LLMs need too.
Who is office hours for?
It’s for engineering leaders who’ve been stuck on the same problem for months, unsure the current approach is right, and want an outside engineer’s perspective before moving forward.
Thinkmill is the real deal – the team are expert designers and engineers, but with real-world experience that means they know how to cut-through and achieve business goals.
Justin Maury
Chief Operating Officer, Vocal
- 10+ years in business
- 35+ engineers & designers
- 19+ design systems shipped
- 3.2 years average client engagement
We’re engineering leaders
- We’ve worked with the names you already trust. Atlassian, Westpac, ANZ, the Australian Government, ELMO, and Brighte have all brought us in to help ship real products.
- We bring deep expertise. Our 35+ engineers and designers bring decades of R&D and open source experience to every engagement, so you’re working with people who’ve solved this before.
- We built tools the industry runs on. We’re the creators of React Select, with more than a million weekly npm installs, plus Keystatic, Keystone and other widely-used open source projects.
- We’re the team people call for design systems. We’ve led, shaped, and contributed to 19+ design systems, from startups and scale-ups, to Atlassian and the Australian Government.
- Our work is the reference others build against. The design system we built for the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries & Forestry is a reference implementation of the Australian Government’s Digital Service Standard, independently audited by Intopia as exemplary for accessibility.
The right ideas + the right people make all the difference and Thinkmill ticks both boxes with the latest in design thinking combined with incredible people who care.
Michael Payne
CEO, AnywhereWorks
How does it work
Apply for a spot
Tell us briefly what’s going on. We review every application and only take on conversations where we think we can genuinely help.
You talk, we listen
Bring your situation. We ask questions, then reflect back the risks, blind spots and opportunities you might have missed.
An outside view you can act on
After the call, we’ll send you a summary of our discussion along with our thoughts on the challenge, outlining how we’d approach it.
Free. 5 spots open monthly.
Book a second opinionThinkmill felt right at home in our team. They tuned in to our people, systems, and goals in rapid time and delivered high quality work from the outset. We couldn’t have asked for a better partner.
Andrew Sladen
Director Of Engineering, Koala
Frequently asked questions
- Genuinely free. We’ve always been generous with our time and knowledge, sometimes to our own detriment, if you ask the team. If it leads to us working together down the track, great. If not, that’s fine too.
- Yes, no problem. Just let us know when you book and we’ll get one sorted before we talk.
- One of our engineering experts or both, not a salesperson or account manager. You’ll be talking to someone who’s done this work before, not someone whose job is to sell it to you.
- We’ll pressure-test your thinking, surface potential risks, and recommend the approach we’d take based on our experience with delivery teams like yours. You’ll leave with a written summary or recorded walkthrough that gives your team a clear path forward.
- Half-formed thinking is fine, that’s often exactly what these calls are for. Bring whatever’s on your mind, even if it’s just “something feels off and I’m not sure why.”
- We’re not going to pretend we’ll solve everything in an hour, or that we have all the answers, this is general advice, not a full diagnosis. But we’re confident you’ll walk away with at least one thing worth taking back to your team.
