Cortessian exists to help leaders make their own decisions about AI
Why Cortessian exists, where the name comes from and the experience behind it.
Senior leaders need enough knowledge to decide for themselves
Every leadership team now has AI questions on the agenda. Yet senior leaders are often being asked to make decisions before they have enough understanding to examine the recommendations being made to them.
Judgement is exactly what senior leaders are supposed to bring to the room. I started Cortessian to give them enough understanding to question recommendations, examine the reasoning behind them and make informed decisions for themselves.
A name about thinking
I wanted a name connected with thinking and reasoning. Finding one that also had an available .com domain ruled out most existing words.
After exploring a lot of different ideas, I arrived at Cortessian. It draws on cortex and deliberately echoes Cartesian — associations with thought, reasoning and examining assumptions.
That fitted what I wanted the business to be about: understanding enough to examine the evidence, question the assumptions and make your own decisions.
Toby Corballis
Founder, Cortessian
I've spent more than twenty-five years working in change and transformation, and more than twenty working with executive leadership teams.
Most of that career has been in technology or technology-enabled change, often while technologies were still emerging. That has included early adoption of cloud technologies and work involving distributed ledgers, as well as more than three years working directly with AI.
I've worked with leadership teams across regulated financial services, investment exchanges, market infrastructure, energy and technology businesses. The technologies and industries have changed, but the executive problem is often similar: there is incomplete information, competing claims, pressure to act and consequences for getting the decision wrong.
Current AI work
My work with AI now includes researching its adoption and testing commercial and open-source models. I'm also a verified member of Oxford Review, which gives me access to current research from around the world.
Cortessian brings those strands together: technology, organisational change and the judgement senior leaders need to decide what to do next — and make it happen.
Start with a conversation
Tell us what AI is putting on your agenda. We can work out whether Cortessian can help.
Book a conversation