Brand
Guidelines
The standards, systems, and principles that define how Assessed Intelligence appears, reads, and behaves in the world.
This book is a working reference for everyone who creates, reviews, or approves work in the Assessed Intelligence name. It covers identity — what we stand for and how we introduce ourselves — the visual system (logo, color, typography, layout), and the document formats that carry our governance work into the world.
If you're building anything customer-facing or partner-visible, this is your starting point. For anything that isn't covered here, reach out before you ship.
This is Brand Guidelines v2.0, released 2026. All prior versions are superseded. Any working files using pre-v2.0 tokens, type families, or lockups should be brought into alignment before next use.
Positioning
Governance that holds up when it matters most.
This is the single sentence that captures what we do and why we're different. It goes where we have one shot to introduce the firm — a website hero, a first-slide deck cover, a door-opener line in a new conversation. It doesn't need a qualifier and it shouldn't be softened.
How to use it
Hero surfaces only. The positioning line earns its weight by scarcity. Don't scatter it across body copy. One placement per page, per deck, per document.
No modifications. Don't shorten it to "Governance that holds up." Don't add "for AI" or "for infrastructure." The strength of the line is in the full cadence.
Companion voice. When the positioning needs a second beat, the character line follows: Forged by Experience · Driven by Purpose · Built to Endure.
Who We Are
A technology and algorithmic consultation, cybersecurity, and auditing firm.
We help organizations implement technology securely and responsibly — providing the disciplined governance required to treat modern systems as critical infrastructure.
The three pillars
| — | Pillar | What it means |
|---|---|---|
01 |
Technology & Algorithmic Consultation | Architecture, AI/ML governance, and the review of algorithmic systems before they ship. |
02 |
Cybersecurity | Posture assessments, control design, and operational hardening for security programs that have to hold under real pressure. |
03 |
Auditing | Evidence-based assessment of controls and claims — the work that produces documents other parties can rely on. |
The Mark
A plain-spoken wordmark. No abstract symbol, no monogram, no brand-name stunt. Just the firm's name, set clearly, with a horizontal rule dividing the two halves.
The mark is a statement of posture. Governance work doesn't benefit from visual flourish. The wordmark signals steadiness and literal meaning — "Assessed Intelligence" printed with discipline — which is the experience we want clients to have with the work itself.
Anatomy
Word 1 — Assessed. Set in the brand display face, uppercase, letter-spaced to the open specimen.
Rule. A 1pt horizontal line spanning the full width of the word above. Never thicker, never a double rule, never dashed.
Word 2 — Intelligence. Same face, lighter weight, tighter spacing, smaller body. The subordinate position is intentional — intelligence follows assessment.
Taglines
Hero — display treatment
&
Responsible
Technology.
Stacked, Title Case, set in Lato on dark ground with a coral terminal period. Used on web hero, campaign openers, and cover surfaces where the tagline carries the composition on its own.
Lockup — formal
The horizontal lockup. Sits beneath the wordmark in footers, sign-offs, and formal collateral. Always Oswald bold uppercase with a turquoise ampersand.
Character line — editorial
The firm's character line. Used on editorial surfaces — report sign-offs, document colophons, recruiting materials — where the tone is earned rather than asserted. Never substitutes for the primary.
Rules
Hierarchy. Never stack both primary taglines on the same surface. One per composition; the hero leads on first introduction.
Translation. Taglines are not translated. Both lines remain in English regardless of market or document language.
Punctuation. Primary: ampersand (&). Character line: pipe (|) with hair-space padding. Do not substitute dashes or bullets.
ARISE Framework™
The ARISE Framework — Assurance of Responsible, Innovative, and Secure Environments — is a proprietary seven-pillar governance model and the methodological backbone of our audit and advisory work. It is a distinct sub-brand with its own identity, always presented with attribution.
Sub-brand rules
Always attributed. First mention on any surface includes the ™ mark and, when space allows, "by Assessed Intelligence." Subsequent mentions can drop the attribution.
6° skew. The ARISE wordmark is set at a 6° forward skew — the sub-brand's single geometric signature. Never apply the skew to the Assessed Intelligence wordmark or to any other element.
Own the domain. Framework documentation lives at ariseframework.com. Deep links from Assessed Intelligence surfaces are fine; embedding framework content under our domain is not.
The seven pillars
Govern · Manage · Identify · Protect · Detect · Respond · Validate. A continuous, interdependent assurance cycle. 128 controls, 889 control requirements, distributed across the seven pillars. Each pillar carries its own color in the ARISE Pillar Palette (slide 17).
Service Architecture
Four named disciplines. Every engagement maps to one or more.
| Discipline | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Implement | Build phase. Architecture, control design, program standup, AI/security engineering. The work that produces new systems fit for governance. |
| Operate | Run phase. vCISO, vCRAIO, managed-governance retainers. Ongoing operational responsibility for the posture we've designed or inherited. |
| Validate | Assessment phase. Audits, attestations, second-party reviews. The work that produces documents other parties rely on. |
| Innovate | Forward phase. Research, framework authorship, IP development (ARISE is the anchor product of this track). |
Internal taxonomy and external proposal structure both use this four-way split. Case studies and capability pages are organized the same way.
Voice & Tone
Four pillars that together describe how the firm talks on the page.
Authoritative
We assess, recommend, and stand behind it. Hedging language (might, could, in some cases) is used only where it's technically warranted, never as a defense mechanism.
Disciplined
We write with structure. Claims are separated from caveats; evidence is cited; conclusions are numbered. The shape of the document reflects the shape of the thinking.
Measured
We don't alarm, oversell, or perform. Governance work loses trust the moment it sounds like marketing. Calm over dramatic.
Humane
We write for the reader across the table. Jargon is used when it's accurate, unwound when it's not. The goal is clarity, not credentialing.
Before shipping any external writing, read it aloud. If a sentence wouldn't survive being read to a client's CEO in a room, rewrite it.
Writing Principles
Lead with the finding. Every report, memo, and section opens with the conclusion. Readers should be able to stop after the first paragraph and know our position.
Cite or don't claim. If a statement could be challenged, it needs a citation — to a control, a document, a log, or a named source. Unsupported assertions are noise.
Numbers over adjectives. "76% of controls implemented" beats "most controls implemented." When we can't quantify, we say so plainly rather than reaching for superlatives.
Name the reader. Every document has one audience. Write to them — CISO, auditor, board, engineer — and don't split the difference.
No passive escape hatches. Avoid "it is recommended that" and "concerns have been raised." Name who is recommending and who is concerned.
Short paragraphs. Dense prose hides weak thinking. Each paragraph carries one claim and its support.
The Logo
A two-word wordmark split by a horizontal rule. Set in the brand display face.
The logo is the most frequently reproduced artifact in the system. Its authority comes from repetition, not from elaboration — which is why there is no graphical mark, no monogram, no shield, no lockup-with-tagline primary. Just the wordmark.
Construction
| Top word | ASSESSED — uppercase, display face, letter-spacing 0.02em, cap height = X |
| Rule | 1pt horizontal line, width = top word width, color inherits from context |
| Bottom word | INTELLIGENCE — uppercase, display face, letter-spacing 0.22em, cap height ≈ 0.48 × X |
Always reach for the vector master (.svg or .ai). Raster exports (.png) are for specific placements and are not acceptable in print above small logo sizes.
Variations
| Variant | Ink | Use |
|---|---|---|
| Primary — Mirage | Ink on light | Default. Use anywhere the surface is white or Desert Storm. |
| Reverse — White | White on dark | Dark surfaces, photo overlays, Mirage backgrounds. |
| Rhino | Navy on light | When the primary feels too heavy and the surface is a pale neutral. |
| Mono — Black | Black on any | Newspaper, single-ink print, fax-era fallback. |
What's not a variant
Color variants (turquoise wordmark, red wordmark) do not exist. Gradient versions do not exist. Drop-shadow versions do not exist. If a variant isn't in the asset library, it's not approved.
Clear Space & Minimum Size
Clear space
The exclusion zone around the logo equals the cap height of the word ASSESSED (X). No competing type, imagery, or rule may enter this zone — including other logos, partner marks, page edges, and UI chrome.
Minimum size
| Medium | Minimum width |
|---|---|
| Digital | 160 px wide |
| 1.25 in wide |
Below these thresholds, the horizontal rule in the wordmark collapses visually. Use a full-size lockup in supporting collateral, favicons, or reduce the mark only where required by the medium.
Misuse
- Don't stretch, skew, or rotate the logo. The 6° skew is reserved for the ARISE sub-brand wordmark.
- Don't recolor the wordmark. Four approved variants exist. No others.
- Don't substitute the typeface. The wordmark is a drawn glyph set — retyping in Oswald is not equivalent.
- Don't add drop shadows, outlines, glows, or bevels.
- Don't place the logo over busy imagery without a solid backing plate.
- Don't pair the logo with emoji, icons, or decorative flourishes.
- Don't rebuild the lockup with the two words on a single line — the rule separator is structural.
- Don't resize the words independently of each other.
Primary Palette
Four colors carry the majority of every composition. These are the surfaces, the ink, and the rules.
Secondary Palette
Two deep-tone neutrals that expand the ink range without introducing color temperature shifts.
Accent Colors
Two accents. Used sparingly, with precise jobs.
Radical Red is always intentional. A stray accent-color border or button on an otherwise neutral surface is a style drift, not brand. When in doubt, leave it out.
ARISE Pillar Palette
Seven colors — one per ARISE pillar. Used exclusively when labeling, categorizing, or visualizing the framework itself.
ARISE pillar colors are framework-specific. They appear on ARISE Explorer (ariseframework.com), pillar tokens, domain diagrams, audit reports that map findings to pillars, and ARISE-branded marketing surfaces. Do not mix with the Primary or Secondary palettes as decorative fills — a coral tile next to a Desert Storm card reads as off-brand. If you're not labeling a pillar, use Mirage / Rhino / Desert Storm instead.
Pillar badges: small rounded pills with the pillar name in white, background = pillar color. Accent underlines: 4px colored bar along the bottom of domain tiles (see Partner Hub). Diagram fills: use at full saturation for categorical nodes; lighten to 15% alpha for background zones. Never on body text, never in the logo, never in the Certification Mark.
60 / 30 / 8 / 2
The proportion rule that keeps work on-brand even when an individual token is swapped.
60% primary neutral — the paper-and-ink majority. Desert Storm, Mirage, or white depending on surface.
30% secondary — Rhino, Iridium, or Ash Grey providing structure and hierarchy.
8% turquoise — eyebrows, active states, punctuation. Present but never dominant.
2% radical red — the hardest constraint. Used as a signal, not a style. One red element per surface is usually enough; two is often too many.
Oswald
The condensed, industrial display family that carries headers, titles, and metric callouts. Uppercase only, with a disciplined letter-spacing.
Intelligence
Use
Decks and documents. Section titles, slide titles, page numbers, cover display, metric big-numbers.
Web. Hero heads, slide titles on the home page, positioning statements. Body headers on web stay in Lato display weights — Oswald is reserved for hero-level emphasis.
Weights
Oswald 500 (Medium) is the default display weight. Oswald 600 (Semibold) for the metric big-numbers. 700 is available for cases where the 6° skew is applied to the ARISE sub-brand wordmark. Lighter weights (300, 400) are not used.
Earlier versions of the brand used Rift. Oswald is the v2.0 substitute — functionally identical in posture, universally available via Google Fonts, and free of licensing friction.
Lato
The humanist sans-serif that carries body copy, long-form reading, and most of the web interface.
Weights
| Weight | Use |
|---|---|
| Lato 300 (Light) | Lead paragraphs, hero subheads, oversized display body. |
| Lato 400 (Regular) | Default body text. |
| Lato 700 (Bold) | Strong emphasis, button labels, section-intro emphasis. |
| Lato 900 (Black) | Rare. Reserved for editorial moments that need extra weight. |
Type System in Use
| Role | Face / weight | Case & spacing |
|---|---|---|
| Display / Hero | Oswald 500 | Uppercase · 0.02em |
| Slide title | Oswald 500 | Uppercase · 0.03em |
| Eyebrow | Lato 700 | Uppercase · 0.22em, 11px |
| Body | Lato 400 | Sentence case, 16px, 1.55 line-height |
| Body — lead | Lato 300 | Sentence case, 22px, 1.5 line-height |
| Metric big-number | Oswald 600 | Uppercase · tight — 76%, 166, etc. |
| Mono / metadata | JetBrains Mono 500 | Uppercase · 0.22em, 11px — page labels, version tags |
Graphic Elements
Non-type elements that repeat across the system and carry brand recognition on their own.
Frame with corner ticks
A 1pt Rhino rectangle with small tick marks at each corner. Used on document pages, deck slides, and feature cards. The ticks are structural punctuation, not decoration — always the same size, always aligned to the rule.
Rules & dividers
1pt Rhino or Ash Grey, depending on contrast. Never 2pt+, never dashed, never gradient. Section breaks use a short 80px Rhino bar.
Red dot bullets
Small 6×6px Radical Red squares for list items. A list with more than one red-dot item is rare — use sparingly; for longer lists use default bullets.
Metric cards
White card with a 4px Radical Red top border and a large Oswald 600 number. Reserved for signature statistics (e.g., the 76% control coverage metric). Don't populate with minor figures.
Applications
A short tour of the surfaces where the brand appears — web pages, decks, documents, digital, and environmental.
Website. Capability pages (ARISE Framework, Audits, vCISO, vCRAIO, Implement, Operate, Validate, Innovate) follow a common skeleton: dark hero, supporting frame sections, signature metric card, and the ARISE references rail.
Decks. 1920×1080, dark-and-light alternation, one idea per slide. Master templates live in the Brand Kit.
Documents. Audit reports, external memos, statements of work, and pitch decks each have their own template — covered in the next section.
Digital. LinkedIn banner, email signature, Google Workspace mark. The brand reads the same in the inbox as it does on the report cover.
Certification Mark
The graphical seal we grant to audited-and-validated partners. A distinct artifact from the primary wordmark, used only by authorized third parties.
Who may use it
ARISE Control Partners at the Preferred (Vetted) tier and any audited client whose engagement has concluded with a passing attestation. Authorization is time-bounded — the mark carries a vintage year.
How it's used
On the partner's own surfaces: website trust bar, product page, sales one-pager, investor deck. Always with "Assessed by Assessed Intelligence" wordmark beneath, and always at or above the minimum size in the certified-mark spec.
What's not permitted
No recoloring, no resizing of elements within the mark, no placement that implies a broader relationship than the audit scope.
Document Templates
Three document formats carry the majority of what leaves the firm. Each has its own master, its own cadence, and its own identifier scheme.
| Document | ID format | Use |
|---|---|---|
| Audit Report | AI-AUD-YYYY-NNNN |
Formal attestation output. Carries ARISE domain mapping, evidence index, and numbered findings. |
| External Memo | AI-MEMO-YYYY-NNNN |
Client-facing position document. Shorter than a report, longer than an email. Used for recommendations, posture updates, and decision briefings. |
| Statement of Work | AI-SOW-YYYY-NNNN |
Engagement contract. Scope, deliverables, timeline, commercial terms. |
Common structure
All three share the same cover (Mirage background, wordmark top-left, title in Oswald, ID in Mono, vintage year), the same frame-with-ticks page system, and the same three-line centered footer.
Footer
Assessed Intelligence · AI-AUD-2026-0001
Secure & Responsible Technology
Forged by Experience · Driven by Purpose · Built to Endure
Templates and working files live in the Brand Kit's Resources section. Don't start a document from a blank — always fork the master.
Digital & Social
The brand reduced to pixels: LinkedIn, email, Google Workspace, and the handful of places where we're measured in 40×40px icons.
Cover banner: Mirage background, wordmark top-left at safe-margin. The banner rotates between a "positioning" variant (governance line at 60px) and a "service" variant (a single capability name set large). Profile avatar: reduced wordmark mark or the square Google Workspace mark.
Email signature
Name, title, Assessed Intelligence, then phone if relevant, then one link (assessedintelligence.com). No quote, no tagline, no banner image.
Favicon and small-format
Where a square format is forced (favicon, Slack logo, app icon), use the reduced wordmark mark — AI set in Oswald 500 on Mirage with the horizontal rule. The full two-word wordmark does not scale below the minimum size in these places.
Governance
A brand doesn't stay disciplined by accident. Somebody owns it, somebody approves new uses, and there's a clear path for proposing changes.
Brand custody
The Brand & Leadership team owns the system and the asset library. New assets, new lockups, new applications go through them before deployment.
Version control
Guidelines are versioned on a calendar cadence (currently v2.0, 2026). Between versions, additions are published as appendices in the Brand Kit. Contradictions are resolved by the most recent artifact — the Brand Kit app is the source of truth.
Asking questions
For anything that isn't covered in this document, reach out before you ship. A 2-minute conversation beats a week of rework.
Brand & design questions: brand@assessedintelligence.com
Partner program: partners@assessedintelligence.com
Press & speaking: press@assessedintelligence.com