About
Software should work. Prices should be plain. Deadlines should mean something.
I'm Lister Potter. Wind Walker Studio is my consulting practice.
The year I first got paid to write code
Thirty-seven years of shipping software gets you two things: a deep respect for the ways projects go sideways, and a set of habits for keeping them from going sideways. Wind Walker Studio is where those habits meet fixed-price consulting.
The short version
What I've been doing.
I've been shipping software professionally since 1989. Along the way I've built for banks and lenders, marketing platforms, healthcare, e-commerce, and small businesses that just needed something to work. Most of my recent decade has been in high-stakes financial systems — payments, reconciliation, settlement — where correctness isn't optional and outages cost real money.
My most recent long engagement was rebuilding financial-correctness controls for a regional lender's payment processing infrastructure, using a multi-agent AI orchestration model I designed to compress delivery time on high-stakes engineering work. That same model — real production AI, not chatbot theater — is what makes fixed-price delivery viable at the pricing I offer.
Wind Walker Studio applies that discipline to smaller-scale work: websites, mobile apps, custom automation, and AI integrations for small businesses and professional practices. Every engagement is fixed-price. You know the number up front. Milestones are tied to real deliverables. Every deliverable passes through independent quality review before it reaches you. And I stand behind the work for 30 days after launch. If we agree on a scope, I ship it.
Process
How I actually work.
Discovery first
Before I quote anything, I understand what you actually need. That's a real conversation, not a form.
Fixed proposal
Scope, deliverables, timeline, and price — one document. You sign it, we start. No hourly meter.
Milestone payments
Typically 40% at kickoff, 40% at design approval, 20% at launch. You always know what you've paid for.
Weekly written check-ins
A short written update every week. Progress, blockers, what's coming. No mystery.
Independent quality review
Every deliverable is reviewed by our QA lead before it reaches you. Spec verification, functional testing, edge cases. A second set of eyes on everything that ships.
Change orders in writing
If scope shifts, you get a written amendment with price and timeline impact. You approve before I build.
30 days of free fixes
After launch, anything not working right gets fixed at no charge for the first 30 days.
The team
Two people. Real accountability.
Wind Walker Studio is intentionally small. Two people, each with a clear role, doing work they've each done professionally for years. When you hire us, you know who's building and who's checking.
Principal
Lister Potter
Started shipping software professionally in 1989. Thirty-seven years across financial systems, marketing platforms, AI orchestration, and small-business software. Every engagement's decisions, design, and code review pass through his hands.
- →37 years shipping production software
- →15 years in fintech
- →Designer of the multi-agent orchestration model used on every project
Quality Review
Lister Potter, III
Working QA professional. Independent review on every project before launch — spec verification, functional testing, edge cases, and pre-launch sign-off. His job is to make sure the version you see is the version I meant to ship.
- →Software Quality Assurance
- →Independent pre-launch review
- →Second set of eyes on every deliverable
Plus a production multi-agent AI model I designed and validated in enterprise financial systems work — used on every project to compress delivery time without cutting corners. And trusted partners brought in per-project when the scope calls for content writing, graphic design, or specialty legal review.
Boundaries
What I don't do.
Setting expectations honestly:
- ×Hourly retainer work. I quote projects, not hours.
- ×Offshore-team-behind-the-curtain arbitrage. When you hire us, you get us — the two people on the About page, not a hidden team someone else is managing.
- ×Content writing or graphic design in-house. I have partners I refer you to when you need them.
- ×Race-to-the-bottom pricing. If cheapest is what matters most, I'm not your fit.
- ×Promises about search rankings or lead volume I can't guarantee. I promise good work; the market decides the rest.
Confidentiality
Discretion is the default.
I never publish client names, logos, or project details without written permission. Case studies on this site describe the work and the impact, not the client. If you become a client and want to be a public reference later, we can talk about it then — but discretion is the default.
For professional-practice clients — attorneys, accountants, medical practices — this matters even more. Privileged information incidentally encountered during a project is not to be discussed, copied, or referenced. Ever.
A byproduct of this posture: my public portfolio shows less than my career reflects. Most enterprise software I've shipped lives behind login walls, under NDA, or belongs to previous employers. I'm happy to walk you through past work in detail on a discovery call — the shape of a project, the decisions, the outcome — even when I can't share links. If you become a client and give permission after we ship, your project joins what I show publicly.