51. Fractional COO: Is it worth it?

Karina 0:00

Music.

Brandon 0:05

Hello everyone. And we are back with another episode of the operations room, a podcast for coos. I am Brandon mensinga, joined by my lovely co host Bethany Ayers, how are things going? Bethany,

Bethany Ayers 0:16

they're going pretty well. This is our last summer with the kids. I know we'll have them next year, but it feels that way. My husband does the walk to school with our youngest every day. He counted down. He was like, 10, more, nine, more than the final day. He said, you want to join us? And I just know this is your thing. Some solid father son time commemorating the final walk to school ever. It's just very early to have all of these finals. But what we also did is the youngest decided he wanted to bleach his hair again this year. He did it last summer, and so we did it on the very first weekend that school broke out to maximize hair growth before next year. Last year, he wanted it to be blue, but he has very dark hair, and so it wouldn't actually have turned blue without bleaching it. So I bleached it first and then turned it blue, but he has a huge amount of hair, and it came out very patchy and very orange, and the blue worked somewhat, but we learned from our lessons. So this year, he had a haircut to begin with. So it's much shorter. I researched how to bleach hair, and so I bought all of the specialist products. And instead of listening to the original instructions, specialist stuff said to keep it on for a full 90 minutes. And so the combination of 40 somethings of hydrogen peroxide and 90 minutes it came out Eminem. And not only did I do the whole bleaching, we then had to put a toner on top to get rid of any of the last brassiness. So it's really yellow and not orange, and it's looking good. But he has very, very dark eyebrows, and he goes like somewhere between Eminem and flea

Brandon 2:10

Okay. Okay. So the obvious question is, why? What's Possessing Your your son to want to bleach his hair as part of his summer routine?

Bethany Ayers 2:17

I don't know, because he can. It's different. I think he's quiet and shy, but also a bit of a performer, and likes to have some attention, and so having bright yellow hair gives him loads of attention without actually having to open his mouth.

Brandon 2:35

That definitely sounds like a teenager thing to do, for sure. Yeah,

Bethany Ayers 2:38

it was early, early years of teenagehood. So we did that. It took hours, hours and hours, but it was a good mother son bonding moment. And so we have to decide at the end to shave it all off, because it's only going to be two months worth of hair growth, or dye it back to Brown.

Brandon 2:58

Okay, you can't just let it ride. Do you think it might look cool? Actually, a bit of a multi color thing going on

Bethany Ayers 3:05

well. So last year he did that and cut it short, but there was still a lot of the of the bleach that kind of had tips highlights of it. And then he said, a bit of a of a fad at school, and quite a few other boys in the early September, October time, also bleached the tips of their hair, and everybody had a similar look going on. So he could be a trendsetter again this year. We'll see. Well,

Brandon 3:30

remember, I told you about my my early 20s, Backstreet Boy, golden tips that I used to frost on my hair when I was back in the zone. Did you do it yourself. No, I went to the hairdresser, of course, to get that done. If I get the urge to get frosted tips again, as a 50 year old man, I will come to you, Bethany to do that.

Bethany Ayers 3:49

I will know how to do it and not make you have grassy hair. That'd

Brandon 3:54

be great. Okay, so we've got a great topic for today, which is fractional COO, is it worth it? And we have an amazing guest for this, which is Karina Mikkeli. She is the founder of fractional united, and has held several CEO positions over the course of her career, and of course, now is a fractional COO, so before we get to Karina, just wanted to ask you a couple of questions. Bethany, the first one is, what are your lessons learned in building your Ned career and a bit of this solopreneur activity you've done over the past year as well.

Bethany Ayers 4:27

I actually gave a talk to Nicola Anderson cmo community in London slash the UK, around how to land your first paid and I'm going to be talking about it in maybe October again for my free course, so I can give a abbreviated conversation about it now and then, if you want to hear more, join one of those is it's all about network, but it's not about how broad your network is, but rather how deep. And so most of my. Seats have come from two people, actually, who I just know really well, who have introduced me to quite a few different people, and I didn't do it on purpose, but people who are influential and have power, who respect you and want to help you are immensely valuable people in your network. And I think you have the same Brandon. Don't you like you? You have your mentor?

Speaker 1 5:21

Yeah, I have a core set, yeah. So find

Bethany Ayers 5:25

that person or people and continue the relationship. I wouldn't say develop it or be manipulative or using, because there's a reason why you have a relationship, and just make sure to continue that relationship. Another one is, don't be afraid to ask for money, and don't be afraid to walk away if it's under what you're willing to pay, or they're giving you the great opportunity of working for free. Thank them. But carry on until you get one that actually pays you. So that's in terms of how to land a board seat and also figure out what your elevator pitch is. Why are you valuable on a board and be able to share your values. So for example, I have three areas that I can bring to the board. One is my go to market spike. I hate that term, but it's become ubiquitous and easy to understand. So I can help teams figure out their product market fit, their go to market motion, and hire the team to take advantage of that understanding scale from series A through C, because I've seen it many times, and I have done so many rounds of fundraising that I can act as a bridge between the exec team and the investors and help translate between them what's actually going on, and therefore help in board conversations. And those are basically the three things I talk about. So figure out what your things are and sell them and articulate it clearly. Have some examples to give. So that's what I've learned in terms of how to land board seats. And then the other thing is let people know that you're looking for them, because it's not just going to magically land on your lap if nobody knows that you're in the market. And then for the solopreneur, that's been just a really interesting journey of figuring out what I have to offer. And interestingly, when I first left peak and was desperate to figure out what I was going to do, and what can I offer, and why would anybody listen to me. I held on so tightly. I figured out all these ways. What am I bridging? What are the groups, or blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and everything I did I just didn't love. And then when I just let go and followed my interest, this course, came about. The free talks happened, the podcast was probably the first example of that, where I've had the most success when it has felt the easiest. So it doesn't feel like work, it feels hard and it feels like we're doing a lot of work, but it's not draining or enervating. Instead, it's energizing, even if it does mean that we have to put a lot of time into it.

Brandon 8:08

ional CEO space right now, in: 2024

Bethany Ayers: 10:14

in between new voice media and peak I did consulting for a few years, and I was not looking to make it be my full time gig or permanent gig. I just didn't want anybody to forget about me. But even with that, I found the feast and famine of it really frustrating, because when you're busy, you don't have time to business develop. And then when you're not busy, you can have those conversations and say, Oh, by the way, I'm available. I'd end up with like, three projects, and then, because I was worried about not having any of them, taking all of them on, and then working 12 hour a day, seven days a week, totally exhausted, finish those and have like, two or three months off. Wondering, was, am I ever going to get anything again? That's the downside of fractional until you can get to some sort of consistency. And that's why, when I left peak this time, I actively did not want to go into the fractional space. Is I did not want to have to deal with the feast or famine. And the upside of board so NAD and advisor roles is that it's, in effect, salaried, so it almost gives you a salary retainer type thing. So I know I have a consistent amount of income without having to worry about the feast or famine. So part of it would be, you do need to work on your pipeline. But the other part is, how can you secure some consistent income along the way? And then, in terms of building pipeline, letting people know that you are open, actively looking what you can offer, and then not only your network and your extended network, but asking them for any referrals as well, and just push it out as much as possible. So much of this comes from people knowing people rather than answering a job advert, it's all jobs that are not listed.

Brandon: 12:07

So I think that's the number one thing that I would recommend, which I've done myself, which is I have a referral network that I've built over the past decade, working in these companies, across venture capital firms and alongside of other kind of senior executives. I've taken that over the past year and a half, and I've really referred myself into a much wider, more expansive network, in a sense which is going from one referral to the next, which is classic kind of referral based sales, where I'm talking to one VC they know three other VCs, and therefore I get recommended at least a mutual introduction into that next contact to have a conversation with the other bit I wanted to mention was that almost all of my introductions that's evolved into consulting or fractional started with advisory or conversations with the CEO, and in particular for fractional CEO, that conversation that you're having as an advisor or simply as a one off to get to know them a little bit. And there are problems that's the starting point. Most Significant contract was me chatting with that founder three times over the course of three months before anything actually happened. So I had to build a relationship, build trust, build confidence that they felt I could do something useful for them. And off the back of that three month cycle of those three conversations that evolved into a fabulous contract for myself. But again, all this takes time and effort. And again, right place, right time, right conversation. And I think the

Bethany Ayers: 13:31

other, I'm not sure if you're gonna ask this question, but another element of not necessarily developing pipeline, but once you start to have those conversations, be easy to do business with, so be able to articulate why you but then also how to work together. What you're charging, what your prices are like, and what are the packages look like, and also in your proposal, take the lead, because often they've never hired this role before or this type of advisory work. So you say, this is how I typically work. Blah, blah, blah, these prices, this format, retainer, not retainer, whatever it is. And then say, from what you've said in the conversation, I suggest we break it down into three areas. This is the most important one, boom, boom, boom. And this would be your first deliverable, or this would be the end, or the milestone at the end of this one that would kick off the next and so, and I'm not talking in a PowerPoint, not 20 pages long, one email that would fit on a normal sized email that you would read on your mobile without being overwhelmed. Also adding in from what we talked about, this is what I would suggest we start here. It sounds like this is your priority, or we had a conversation, you said this was your priority, but as we carried on, I think actually the underlying thing is this, I would suggest we start with that first, so you're already demonstrating your value. You're doing it very concisely, so that they'll read it and to you just look like you know what you're talking about. And if you have a lot of confidence, they'll respond to that, because they're paying for your expertise and confidence. And so you need to demonstrate it from the start. It's all about demonstrating your value. The other question

Brandon: 15:20

I wanted to ask you was, what did you think of karina's 321 model? So she talked about the 321 model, meaning that she would spend 15 hours per week as a retainer working with the company. 15 hours was allocated to get her up to speed, to learn the business, learn the founder, learn the organization, start delivering value, and so on. Then eventually she would shift into the two, which is 10 hours per week, which is much more about optimization of the business and doing some of the heavy lifting and so on, presumably. And then she moved to one, which was five hours per week, which she described as kind of maintenance. What do you make of that that three to one model?

Bethany Ayers: 15:57

Even though I hate having to do any sort of framework myself. I'm also a bit keen on some and I was like, oh, that's just, you know, fresh and easy to understand.

Unknown Speaker: 16:06

I know 32132, yeah.

Bethany Ayers: 16:09

And I also love it's such an operator's view of the world. Like, again, back to this point, to making it easy to engage with you and easy for people to understand how you work. Super clear. The only

Brandon: 16:19

question that I had in my head was just around the actual literal time itself. I was like, okay, so you can make a real impact on the organization as a fractional CEO within 10 hours per week. So it's roughly what that is like a day and a half or something. Seems limited. I

Bethany Ayers: 16:34

think there's a difference between doing advisory, interim fractional work and doing consulting work. And so if you're a fractional you're there as the COO or the CFO or the CMO. You're not there to produce deliverables. You're there to lead a team, build a team, be part of the exec team. So I can see how you can actually have huge amounts of impact in 10 or 15 hours, particularly if you're building out a team. You don't have to go to a lot of the filler events. Last

Brandon: 17:11

question, she also talked about working with, on average, two to five clients actively on her roster, and said that for her, she comes back at the end of the day being an introvert, and she's pretty smashed at the end of it just, you know, just sucked up in terms of her energy. And we talked about this a bit in the conversation, but I'm just curious a bit more from yourself Bethany, how can one manage their energy in a better way to satisfy the needs of the organization?

Bethany Ayers: 17:39

So I'm on four boards now, which is a lot less of a time commitment, but I still struggle on days when all of the busses arrive at the same time, which does seem to happen, all the crises happen on the same day. And I think it's time blocking, not just the work or the companies, but also the decompression time, like not going on back to backs, which I do sometimes, because I don't protect my own boundaries. Oh, I have half an hour. Do you want to take that half an hour for a completely massive context switch? Of course, I will do that because, you know, I will people please and make sure that I'm doing the right thing and being a good girl. I think if it's doing it longer term, I would have to actually say I don't have that half an hour. It doesn't exist. You can't see my calendars. I'm saying, Nope, that's booked. Let's go for the next day. I think it's just around holding your boundaries and being confident to hold them. I

Brandon: 18:40

often have done the same thing in the past, which is, I'll take four back to backs over the course of an afternoon, totally different topics, because as a CEO, oftentimes what you're dealing with is very diverse subject matter. Once I get into that fourth back to back, I'm not at a good state, and my usefulness and contribution and ability to really craft a great outcome tends to be quite compromised, to be honest. And in my head, what I'm doing, justification wise, is to be able to push through and just keep going. More is better to kind of drive the business forward. And the reality is that I'm an idiot, and it doesn't actually make sense. And by the time I get into that fourth chat, like I said, I'm not adding value in a very useful ways,

Bethany Ayers: 19:21

and it's so much easier said than done. And so I do find after our conversation around how I don't lie, lying is actually really helpful. It's hard when people can see your calendar. I've known of people who've like put pretend meetings in. Now that people can't see my calendar, I am getting more comfortable lying about my availability, because I'm not actually lying. It's not that I don't want that meeting. I know I will be better if I do something else, but because I technically have that hour, I feel as though I'm lying when I say no, I don't, even though you know what I mean, like I should not take it so any. Now you can tell I've had a lot of conflict in this internal conflict on this one,

Brandon: 20:04

but I've never heard of a person putting in a fake calendar appointment. Like, does that happen? Do people do that? I was

Bethany Ayers: 20:11

listening to it was some guy, CEO, I can't remember who, and he had maybe call mom, but Mom stood for, stood for something I don't remember the initials were, and because it was called mom, nobody moved it in his diary, but it was basically just his break where he needed to get stuff done. All right,

Brandon: 20:31

so with that, let's go on a quick break, and when we come back, we will have our conversation with Karina.

Karina: 20:40

I don't even know when fractional first started being a thing. I think it was like four years ago, three years ago, that I heard the term. But it often happens with small businesses. They don't need or can afford a COO full time. On the one hand, it's way more popular, right? Like more people want to be it. There's actually some even large media articles about it, but on the other hand, it felt harder and lonelier than before. I now know that's because there's way more supply than demand, but I didn't know that back then. I was just like, the whole concept of fractional is that you can do this part time because you're not executing, you're leading, you're strategizing. You're the one who works through your team. And you can't do that if you haven't had the experience before. You know leadership is hard enough done right? You can't start out doing it part time. You have to have done it well and done it full time before you can be effective part time.

Brandon: 21:41

Your 2024 definition for a fractional CEO, what does that look like? And what kind of variations do you see around that spectrum? Because we all come from different backgrounds and different experiences. To your point, we all have leadership experience being a CEO in different ways. So what does that descriptor look like? So

Karina: 22:00

a fractional COO is a part time fully embedded coo that, like any other COO, partners with a CEO to run the business. No two coo jobs are alike, right? It's really a compliment to what the CEO doesn't want to do. Literally, what it generally is, is a partner to the CEO. And the only difference between a fractional COO and a full time COO is that it's part time. Then

Bethany Ayers: 22:31

if it's part time, I get do people do more than one at a time? I always equate my relationship with a CEO like having a second marriage, and I'm not quite sure I could have like, three or four marriages on a go, like that just sounds completely exhausting. It was like none of the fun, just all of the work.

Karina: 22:53

It is challenging. So I have this, like, 321, model, where I start off more hours, because, you know, in the beginning, you have to learn right, what's working, what's not, and understand things. And I become more fractional as I start to implement systems and optimize things. And then I have, like, a maintenance level that is very fractional. It's a weekly retainer. It's like up to 15 hours, 10 hours, and then five hours. So depending on like, I can do one at the three level, you know, two at the two level, and have like, you know, few at maintenance. There are more challenges to being fractional than just juggling the work and doing more. It's not a direct correlation, right? It's like, because there is so much more that goes into it than just like, how many hours the CMOS and the CFOs can do a lot more. There was a CFO in the community who had like 10 clients at once, which, you know, they come in like once a month to do high level planning or whatever. So makes sense. But you know, like, if you're involved daily, and you're running the business, and everything escalates to you there is limited, and to your point, you can burn out because it is a lot. I personally can handle three to five, depending on where I am, if it's in the beginning stages, more like two to three max.

Brandon: 24:18

And I'm sure this also impacts the sales cycle for getting the fractional CEO roles to begin with, because fundamentally, if that CEO needs to be a partner or needs to trust you, inherently, that takes time, you know, and you can't just do that overnight. If you're a CMO or a CFO, I think it's different. There's more straight up black box skills you can walk in with to execute a particular project. But if you're coming in as a fractional CEO to win that business, part of it is to get that CEO in a position where they're going to believe in you and trust you. And to do that, I suspect, requires more time as part of your selling process.

Karina: 24:51

I treat these conversations as a two way interview. I don't treat them like consultants do. I don't do proposals and bids. You know, it's. It's a conversation. It's an interview both way, because the relationship is so critical. We've all worked with or no CEOs that can't get out of their own way to save their life.

Brandon: 25:10

Tell me the son like, how, how do you win business? Because previously, over the past year and a half, when I've been doing consulting as a fractional CEO myself, primarily, the window by which I've entered businesses is usually some weird amalgamation of venture capital people or talent people within those companies, being referred into these accounts where these companies are struggling. For some reason, I get referred in, and then what starts out is not really fractional CEO work, what starts out as an advisory agreement, kind of like you just said, where I drop in once a month, I have a chat with the CEO. We build a relationship. We build trust. He's looking for guidance in some form. I provide that. And based on that advisory entry point, then at that point, they're like, Okay, I like you. You like me. I provide good value to you, and you'd like to actually have me come in on more of an actual fractional basis to help you, so that that's the probably the three largest contracts that I won last year were all in that fashion. So I'm just curious from your your work, what do you see as the channels of entry as a fractional to get in there to make that happen?

Karina: 26:09

I will say that the biggest challenge all fractionals face is finding the work that is number one. The hardest thing is business development and networking and and juggling doing the work, but keeping a pipeline. And many people hated myself included, you know, we're operators. We're not salespeople. It's really, really hard. We're seeing like a lot of larger firms, and especially exec search, are like testing the water with one person focusing on fractional to see how it goes, and if it's worth their while to like branch out to that. I believe at some point it'll get easier, but I've realized the reason it's so difficult now is because of the lack of awareness. You know, most of the companies that could use fractionals don't even know it exists or what it is, so they're not looking for it, and therefore there's a lot of like, education that has to still go into. And that's why, to your point, like you come in as something else, and then you kind of like educate and upsell. But for the most of the community, the way you find the work is through referrals. Someone knows someone, we tend to recommend that people create connections with fractionals adjacent to what they do. So, for instance, as an operator, it's good to have connections with like marketers and finance people and other people, right, who would already be in the same niche that you want to target, and they would know if a fractional coo position could be helpful, and like, make a, you know, make a recommendation. And also, once someone hires one fractional, it's a lot easier to then make a case for the next fractional. I'm

Bethany Ayers: 27:57

going back to the relationship point. You're working with multiple businesses that's a lot of leadership teams to get to know, that's a lot of direct reports to get to know. How do you manage it all and not be massively drained by all of these different situations? I tend

Karina: 28:20

to time block, and every client has times they know I'm available for meetings. And I'm pretty strict about it, like I check in, and if there are, you know, emergencies, obviously, ideally, they're all in Slack. So it's easy for me to see what's going on, and if need be, jump in, but it takes getting used to. It's not easy. I tend to be very drained and selective about other things I do after I'm done. Because I'm an introvert, I keep telling people I need a t shirt that says, discharges quickly, recharges slowly.

Bethany Ayers: 28:55

So like managing time, I get managing energy, I think is much harder, and then also being a fractional does that mean you are more removed from the politics or deeper in the politics

Karina: 29:09

usually more removed. And an interesting thing happens in that because you're fractional, and they get that you're part time, they don't want you to be part of politics. They want you to focus on what matters. They know that you're highly paid and highly experienced, so they actually value your input in a different way. So we had a really interesting conversation in the community. In the early days, I had gone from fractional to full time with a client, and I didn't realize this while it was happening, but in hindsight, there was a slight shift in our relationship when I went full time, and I don't think she realized it, and I didn't realize it till after the fact, when this conversation was happening in the community, and I'm like, oh, that's what happened. I went from being a respected peer to an employee, and even though I was the same person with the same amount of experience, the way I was treated was different.

Bethany Ayers: 30:11

Yeah, I know what you mean. I find it frustrating as much on my side as on theirs. And it's interesting because I don't notice it is, oh, they're treating me differently. I notice it is I'm treating them differently. I'm more differential. Suddenly I care more what they think, and I feel more subservient. And then I get annoyed at myself, and they're like, I hate that we're pack animals and ER and I should be egalitarian. And why am I doing this, but I think it's a really innate we immediately come into the pack, and somehow being hired full time is different to being advisor, and you become part of the pack and find your way in fascinating and frustrating.

Karina: 30:57

So part of it is you belong to them, right? But the other part is also, like, it's a lot easier, or it was a lot easier before I went full time, I had three to five at any point, and I could tell when one was coming to an end, right? And I started looking, it's a lot easier to fill, you know, one slot, then all of a sudden go from zero to one. So I think that's part of it. It's like when you know this is your entire livelihood, there's the differential, there's the caring, right? Because you're worried, but if it's one slot, you know you're not going to put

Bethany Ayers: 31:32

up with as much. That's a really good point that makes me feel better and less like a dog and more like a reasonable human who needs to worry about income?

Karina: 31:44

Yeah, we all do. Unfortunately,

Brandon: 31:46

it really is the risk profile, isn't it? I feel like within myself, it's kind of the same thing, which is, I feel like, if they hold the paycheck over my head, for myself and for my family, that is like the single most powerful tool to make me subservient, I suppose, is the reason why people go fractional in the first place, to want to have the independence and empowerment to choose how they want to live, not feel like they're serving a particular person or company. Yeah, I

Karina: 32:12

remember the first time that I said no to a potential client. It was both so scary, but also so liberating.

Bethany Ayers: 32:20

But you can only do that if you have a good pipeline. Because I know people who are fractionals who are struggling to find it, who are taking jobs that they don't want because they're afraid they're not going to find another one. And so it's like, it sounds amazing, but in the current circumstances, I don't actually know very many fractionals who, when you ask a couple questions, are truly happy and not worried. You have 10,000 so what's your experience?

Karina: 32:49

Maybe there's like a quarter who's like new trying to figure it out, not sure they're committed to this. And the rest are somewhere in between, you know, like maybe have a little bit, still not 100% happy. Those are just like my estimates. I haven't I don't have, like, hard numbers. I started the community because I hate business development and networking and wanted my peeps around me. It's easier to take something that's not a perfect fit knowing it is part time and short term. I've said this to my husband, I remember, I remember in the past when I took something I'm like, you know, knowing this isn't like everything I can put up with a lot more temporarily. It's a lot harder when you have to take a full time job. I've been there too, like, we've all been there, you know, you do what you have to do. Or adults.

Brandon: 33:37

So this is a difficult question to answer, but your your 25% guesstimation of those that have made it or are doing a solid job and are committed to being a fractional CEO, what do you see as the characteristics or the skills or kind of the tricks of the trade to get yourself into that 25% what is that?

Karina: 33:56

I think they have established a really good referral network. A few people who have, like, really good connections with VCs and PES constantly get work because they want two or three vetted fractionals that constantly send work to they don't want to hold directory. One

Bethany Ayers: 34:14

of the other things that I think people struggle with is how much to charge and also how to structure it. So I'm not sure if you can share how to charge, but maybe you have some resources. And then it sounds like you have ideas on how to structure I get asked a lot how to work with me, and then I had to figure out ways that people could plug in it, basically create packages. And I'm assuming you need to do the same for doing fractional work.

Karina: 34:39

First off, I would say, do not do hourly. Either do weekly retainer, monthly retainer. I think for ops, weekly makes more sense than monthly. I will say that there are a few fractional chief of staff in the community who prefer to do hourly just because they do. Broad things that they feel that there's always scope creep, and if it's hourly attend, they tend to feel that they are more commensurately paid than if it's like a retainer, but they're the exception. Most of us feel do not do hourly. Hourly devalues. You want to do retainers. I personally do a weekly retainer because, as I said, I have to give it time blocks, right? Like I need to know what hours I'm focused on, which clients and how many clients I can have. I can't do that if it's not a weekly retainer. Even though I say retainer, you still have to have a number for yourself, right? Because then you you work backwards. I've seen some people recommend different kind of formulas. One I've seen is so figure out how much you need to make and work backwards. Is one way another is like, take your w2 and add like, 30% for like, admin and taxes and other things. So I've seen different formulas as a way to come up with that hourly rate, and then you kind of figure out, like, for the three it's basically 15 hours up to 15 hours. So it's my rate times 15 hours. The two is times 10 hours. The one is times five hours. So that's like the 321, and I tell them it's like, even though it's a weekly retainer, there is an hourly component, because I need to block time free, so

Bethany Ayers: 36:25

you're charging in blocks, so they're paying for a week. And if there's an overage, you would presumably charge if you have to, if it's consistently over, or do you just say, no, no, well, if

Karina: 36:37

it's consistently over, then it's a conversation. I try not to let it go consistently over, because obviously there's finite time, right? So if there's something going on, I if it's like a one week, if it's an emergency, it evens out, right? Because when things are running smoothly, I'm not using up all the hours.

Bethany Ayers: 36:58

I was born in America, but I have spent most of my working career in the UK, where we have national health insurance, and therefore we have so much more freedom about being able to go fractional. How do you afford to be fractional? In America with health insurance,

Karina: 37:18

there are companies who are offering affordable benefits for S corps. S corp, it's not a true like Corporation, like a C Corp, any LLC can, like, file as an S corp, and as long as you're filing as an S corp, they can give you, you know, like really raids, because you're part of their umbrella, so you join them, and that's why you have to be an S corp, because it has to be B to B or something weird. There are two in the US that do this, that partner with the community, and that's the best way to do it. But you have to have an LLC, the 1000 is an S corp to be qualified.

Brandon: 37:57

Different question. If you're working full time for a company right now considering going fractional What should I think about in terms of risk and reward here? Because we've got a down market in tech right now. There's a lot of good people floating around. So like you said, there's a tremendous amount of supply happening across the board. So I guess it's a two fold question. What should I think about and timing wise, what would you suggest? So

Karina: 38:19

definitely start networking now, right like ideally, you have the time and you can choose when to make the transition. So start planting the seeds and looking for the work, and have at least one fractional job lined up before you give notice and make the transition, you know, and this is the same for full time or fractional it's a lot easier looking for work when you're working than like when you're not in desperate so if you are doing this voluntarily, give yourself time. Ask questions, talk to people who are doing the work, you know, understand the pros and cons. Realize that it's a very different lifestyle. Yes, when you're w2 you look for work, but you don't have to do the kind of networking to find the work that you do as a fractional or consultant, right? There are job boards you go on, indeed, you go on LinkedIn. You can't do that so much for fractional like not yet. So understand that this is going to be an ongoing lifestyle. Understand you're gonna have to, like, juggle not only all the meetings and calendar in one client, but times two or three. And what does that mean? You know, understand you're gonna have to pay taxes and be your own business on top of doing the work. Like, just really understand the lifestyle, and then start looking for the work. Make sure you can find the work. Make sure that you have something lined up before you take the leap. Karina,

Bethany Ayers: 39:51

that was fantastic information. Thank you so much. You've shared so much with us today. If our listeners can only take one thing. Way from the conversation. What would it be?

Karina: 40:02

I do think that fractional is the way of the future, not only for coos, but for everyone. Because if you think about it, if you're good at what you do, you know, unless you're working for a really large company, it doesn't take 40 hours. So at some point there is going to be an inflection point, and this is going to become more common. It's there. It's not going away. It's not a fad. And if it works for you, you know, if it's something that's interesting to you, because you want to have more opportunity to make choices, opportunity of who you work for, then, you know, start exploring it. But also plan ahead. It's not easy, perfect,

Brandon: 40:47

so plan ahead for a big journey that is a good place to leave us off. So thank you, Karina for joining us on the operations room. If you like what you hear, please subscribe or leave us a comment, and we will see you next week. Bye,