Beyond Credentials: How a Military Engineer Built a Banking Consultancy
Established in 2021, in a shared office on 107A Avenue in Surrey. The thesis was simple — banking doesn't have to be opaque. Four years later, that thesis has produced $4.7M in documented client savings, a 91% retention rate, and a team of four specialists who advise both sides of the banking relationship.
We advise both sides of the banking relationship. That dual perspective — the lender's credit decision framework and the borrower's operational reality — produces sharper advice for everyone. It's the reason municipalities, credit unions, construction firms, and health-tech startups all end up at the same table with us.
Measurable Impact, Not Marketing Claims
These aren't aspirational targets — they're trailing figures from post-engagement surveys and audited client outcomes. The industry average NPS for consulting firms sits at 38. Want to see how these numbers translate into specific client results? Read our case studies.
Beyond the Résumé: How One Bad Meeting Changed Everything
In early 2021, Marcus Devereaux left a 22-year career in the Canadian Armed Forces — retiring as a Major from the Royal Canadian Engineers — and walked into a problem he hadn't anticipated. After deployment rotations in Latvia, Mali, and domestic operations across British Columbia, he'd saved aggressively, built solid credit, and assumed transitioning into civilian financial life would be straightforward. He'd managed multi-million-dollar logistics budgets in theatre, coordinated engineering projects across NATO member states, and maintained a security clearance that required meticulous financial accountability. On paper, he was exactly the kind of borrower a bank should want.
It wasn't. His first meeting with a commercial lender about financing a small property investment in Surrey lasted eleven minutes. The loan officer couldn't interpret his military pension structure, misclassified his deployment income as "irregular," and suggested he "come back when things are more settled." That experience — dismissive, uninformed, and over in the time it takes to brew a pot of coffee — cracked open a much larger issue. If a veteran with a spotless credit history, a government pension, and two decades of financial discipline couldn't get a competent hearing, what was happening to everyone else?
Marcus spent six months conducting informational interviews with credit union executives, commercial lending officers, compliance managers, and fintech founders across the Lower Mainland. He spoke with over 40 professionals across the industry — from branch managers at Schedule I banks to the CEO of a $480M agricultural credit union in the Fraser Valley. What he kept hearing was a mirror image of the client-side problem: banks themselves often struggled to communicate products clearly, onboard commercial clients efficiently, or adapt legacy processes to regulatory shifts without flying in expensive enterprise consultants from Toronto or New York. Credit unions told him their lending turnaround times were hemorrhaging members. Municipalities confessed they hadn't reviewed their banking agreements in a decade. Small business owners described signing covenant packages they'd never fully read.
EasyWeb Consulting opened its doors in September 2021, at 13007 107A Avenue in Surrey. The name was deliberate — "easy" front and center, because that was the operating thesis. Banking doesn't have to be opaque. Credit agreements don't have to be indecipherable. And the people on both sides of the counter — the borrower and the lender — deserve an advisor who speaks both languages fluently. That conviction hasn't changed. The team has grown from one to four, the service lines have expanded to cover everything from commercial lending advisory to personal banking navigation, and the client base now spans municipalities, credit unions, construction firms, tech startups, and community foundations — but the thesis remains the same.
Beyond Slogans: The Five Operating Principles That Shape Every Engagement
How does a military engineer run a consulting firm? With discipline, transparency, and a healthy distrust of ambiguity. These aren't values we designed for a wall poster — they're operational constraints we hold ourselves to, and every client experiences them from day one.
Clarity Before Action
Every engagement begins with a written operations order — adapted from the Canadian Armed Forces' operational planning framework. No one moves until the situation is defined, the mission is stated, and the execution plan is understood by everyone involved — including the client. The operations order includes the situation assessment, mission statement, execution phases, logistics, communication schedule, and deliverable list. Ambiguity is treated as a risk to be eliminated, not a creative opportunity. You'll know exactly what you're getting, when you're getting it, and what it costs before any billable work begins.
Retention Over Acquisition
We track client retention rate and referral origin more carefully than top-line revenue. Our 91% retention rate means that nine out of every ten clients come back for subsequent engagements within 24 months. A client who comes back — or sends a colleague — is the only real proof that the first engagement delivered value. The sales pipeline is a byproduct. This is why we don't spend on advertising or cold outreach; every engagement in our history has originated from a referral, a repeat client, or an inbound inquiry.
Full Transparency of Process
Clients see how the work gets made. Every analytical model, every regulatory memo, every recommendation brief includes the underlying methodology and source material. If Priya builds a lender comparison matrix, you see the weighting criteria and the raw data behind every score. If Derek writes a regulatory interpretation memo, you see the specific OSFI guideline provisions he's referencing. If you want to replicate the analysis internally after we leave, you should be able to. We're building your institutional knowledge, not creating dependency.
Disciplined Communication
Adapted from military communication protocols: updates happen on schedule whether there's news or not. No client should ever chase us for a status update. Weekly situation reports go out every Friday by 4:00 PM Pacific — covering progress against milestones, upcoming tasks, risk flags, and any decisions pending from the client. This cadence applies from the first week of engagement through final delivery. Martin Beaulieu, CFO of Meridian Pacific Properties, called it "the first time in twenty years of hiring consultants" that he never had to ask for a status update.
Honest Debriefs
Every engagement concludes with a structured after-action review — what worked, what didn't, what we'd change. These aren't performative satisfaction surveys. They're candid, sometimes uncomfortable conversations where we own our mistakes and document lessons for the future. Our internal lessons-learned database has over 200 entries, organized by engagement type, industry, and failure mode — and it's referenced before every new engagement kickoff. The database is one of our most valuable internal assets, and it's the reason the same mistake rarely happens twice.
Beyond Titles: The People Behind the Operations Orders
Who actually picks up the phone when you call (617) 272-9375? Here's the team — with their real credentials, real backgrounds, and real reasons for being here. Four people, four distinct specializations, one shared operating discipline.
Marcus Devereaux
Founder & Principal ConsultantCD, PMP, MBA (Simon Fraser University, 2023). Former Major, Royal Canadian Engineers, Canadian Armed Forces (1999–2021). Deployments to Operation REASSURANCE (Latvia), MINUSMA (Mali), and domestic wildfire response in BC. Twenty-two years of operational planning, logistics management, and leading engineering teams in high-stakes environments — skills that translate directly to structuring complex consulting engagements. Marcus leads all client relationships, writes every operations order, and personally conducts after-action reviews. Keeps a whiteboard with every active client's name and next milestone visible at all times. Lives in South Surrey with his wife Janelle and two rescue dogs. Handles banking relationship audits, commercial lending advisory, and complex personal banking navigation — the service he built the company to deliver.
"No one falls through the cracks."
Priya Chandrasekaran
Senior Banking AnalystCFA Level III Candidate, B.Comm (University of British Columbia). Four years as a commercial credit analyst at Coast Capital Savings, where she underwrote and reviewed over 200 commercial credit applications ranging from $500K operating lines to $15M construction facilities. Specializes in loan structuring analysis, covenant review, and banking product comparisons — she's the person who reads the 47-page credit agreement and translates it into a three-page brief your management team can actually act on. Priya builds every lender comparison matrix, conducts fee analysis for banking relationship audits, and coaches clients through commercial banking presentations. Completed the Fat Dog 120 ultramarathon in Manning Park — 120 miles through the Cascade Mountains in under 30 hours.
"The term sheet tells you what the bank is offering. I tell you what it actually means."
Derek Okafor
Regulatory & Compliance ConsultantCAMS (Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialist), LL.B (Osgoode Hall). Six years in financial services regulatory law at a mid-size Vancouver firm, where he advised Schedule I banks and provincial credit unions on OSFI guideline compliance, FINTRAC reporting obligations, and FCAC consumer protection requirements. At EasyWeb, Derek handles OSFI regulatory interpretation (B-13, B-15, E-21, B-20), AML/ATF compliance framework design and review, PIPEDA-aligned data governance, and provincial credit union regulatory requirements. His regulatory compliance advisory work is particularly well-suited to virtual delivery — roughly 40% of his active engagements are fully remote, serving clients from the Fraser Valley to Halifax. Coaches his daughter's soccer team in Newton on weekends.
"Regulations aren't obstacles — they're the rulebook. You play better when you've actually read it."
Tomás Arriaga
Digital Banking & Fintech ConsultantM.Sc. Computer Science (University of Victoria), former Product Manager at Finastra. Five years building digital banking middleware for Finastra's North American clients — including core banking integration layers, payment processing modules, and mobile banking APIs serving institutions with $500M to $5B in assets. At EasyWeb, Tomás advises on core banking migrations, API integration, open banking readiness under Canada's emerging Consumer-Driven Banking framework, and digital channel optimization. He led Pacific Rim Credit Union's $3.2M core banking vendor evaluation — a 42-criteria framework that produced a unanimous board approval and a migration completed two months ahead of schedule. Restores vintage arcade cabinets in his spare time — his office at our Surrey headquarters has a working Ms. Pac-Man machine.
"I translate between what the tech team writes in a spec sheet and what the C-suite needs to approve in plain English."
30-minute initial call, no charge. Fixed-fee engagements with written scope before work begins. Or explore our full service roster first.