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What a fractional COO is
A fractional COO is an experienced operator who works inside your business part-time and owns the operating layer: how work arrives, who does it, how well it is done and what it costs.
The title matters less than the seat. I sit on the leadership side, report to the owner and am accountable for outcomes, not for hours or reports.
Much of what I build is AI systems and automations: a reply drafted for a person to send, a weekly report prepared before the review, a reminder ladder that runs on its own schedule. The systems take the routine work off your desk, and the decisions stay with you.
When to hire one
These are the signals I see most often in growing businesses. Tick the ones that are true for you this month.
If two or more of those are true, the constraint is operations. I wrote about each one, with a one-week test, in when to hire a COO.
What the work looks like week to week
In my own engagements the work falls into five jobs.
- Find the leaks. I map where the business loses time and money, and put a cost on each leak in hours or dollars.
- Build the system that closes each one. A dispatch calendar, a job profitability report, a hiring pipeline, a servicing register. Built by me, inside the tools you already use where possible.
- Document it. Every system gets a written procedure that someone other than the founder can run. See SOPs and accountability systems.
- Run the rhythm. A weekly review with the owner: what moved, what is stuck, what I need decided. Daily contact with the people doing the work.
- Train the team until it holds. The engagement is finished when the team runs the operation without me in every conversation.
What a fractional COO is not
Not a consultant.
A consultant diagnoses and recommends, and making it work is your job. I build the thing and stay until it runs.
Not an operations manager.
A manager executes the system that exists. A COO designs the system, decides what gets measured and changes it when the numbers say so.
Not a full-time executive.
You get senior operating judgment for the part of the week the business needs it, with a defined exit, and without a full-time executive salary.
When not to hire one
If the business is before revenue, you need customers, not infrastructure.
If you want oversight but are not ready to hand over real authority, the engagement will stall, because a COO without access is a consultant with a longer contract.
And if the problem is one broken process, a fixed-scope project is a better purchase than a retainer.
From my own engagements.
Results depend on the business and the starting point. These come from three different industries.
- 46%
Crew payroll as a share of revenue at a field-service company, from over 80% in one quarter.
- 20+to 5
A YouTube production operation cut from 20-plus channels to a focused five. Quality and margin both rose.
- 30min a week
An owner's involvement at a six-location seasonal operation, down from 10-plus hours a day in 90 days.
Questions to ask before you hire anyone
- What will you build in the first 30 days, and how will I check it?
- Which number moves, from what to what?
- What will my team be able to do without you at the end?
- How many clients do you carry at once? I take two or three.
- What happens to the systems when you leave?
How I start
With a 45-minute Operations Leak Audit. You leave with a one-page leak map and the one build I would do first, whether or not we work together. It is the quickest way to find out whether you need a fractional COO at all.
What it looks like in a particular business
I build AI systems and automations for growing businesses in any industry, and I work beside founders as their fractional COO. The role is the same everywhere. What I build first depends on where your work gets stuck.
See what I build and how I work, or the role inside a private lender and a cleaning and home-services company.
