Three people sitting at a round wooden table in a cozy room, engaged in a discussion with notebooks and cups in front of them.

Fractional Chief People Officer

  • A Fractional Chief People Officer partners with founders, CEOs, and leadership teams on a part-time basis to build the leadership, organizational structure, talent strategy, and operating systems needed for growth.

    Unlike traditional HR support, a Fractional Chief People Officer operates as a member of the leadership team. The work may include organizational design, executive hiring, leadership-team effectiveness, compensation, workforce planning, international growth, culture, AI adoption, and organizational transformation.

  • A fractional model is appropriate when a company needs experienced People leadership but does not yet require, or is not ready to hire, a full-time Chief People Officer.

    This often occurs when rapid growth is creating organizational complexity, the CEO is spending too much time on people decisions, leadership capability has not kept pace with the business, or the company is preparing for executive hiring, international expansion, restructuring, or transformation.

  • There is no single employee threshold. The need is usually driven by organizational complexity rather than headcount alone. Companies often benefit from fractional People leadership when they are preparing for rapid growth, building a leadership team, expanding internationally, introducing new operating models, or making decisions that will shape how the organization scales.

  • The work should produce stronger leadership, clearer organizational structure, better decisions, and an organization that can support growth without adding unnecessary complexity or overhead.

    Depending on the company’s needs, outcomes may include clearer roles and decision rights, a stronger leadership team, improved manager capability, more effective executive hiring, an organizational design aligned with business strategy, a deliberate talent and compensation strategy, and scalable People systems.

    The objective is not to create more HR activity. It is to build an organization that can grow and perform effectively.

  • Building an AI-first workforce requires more than purchasing new technology. It requires redesigning work, clarifying which decisions require human judgment, determining which capabilities the organization will need, and helping leaders and employees adopt new ways of operating.

    A Fractional Chief People Officer can help leadership connect AI investments to organizational design, talent strategy, manager capability, workforce planning, and business outcomes. The goal is to use technology to increase organizational capability, not simply automate existing processes.

  • Look for someone who has served as a Chief People Officer inside scaling organizations, not only advised them from the outside.

    The right person should understand how organizational design, leadership, executive hiring, compensation, talent strategy, technology, and culture affect one another. They should have experience with the type of growth or transformation the company is facing and be able to determine what should be built now, what can wait, and what should not be built at all.

    They should also be capable of operating credibly with founders, CEOs, executive teams, boards, and investors. description

A Track Record of Helping Scaling Organizations

For more than two decades, I’ve helped organizations navigate the leadership and organizational challenges that accompany growth.

Organizations don't struggle because they lack talent. They struggle because their organizations haven't evolved as quickly as their businesses. My role is to help leadership close that gap.

As a Chief People Officer, I've partnered with founders, CEOs, boards, and investors to solve the organizational challenges that emerge as companies scale. Selected experience includes:

  • Scaled a global technology company from approximately 90 to 800 employees across multiple countries.

  • Partnered with executive leadership through rapid growth to more than $100M ARR.

  • Increased employee engagement from the low 50s to 78%.

  • Reduced regrettable attrition to under 4%.

  • Led organizational design, executive hiring, compensation, and international expansion.

  • Helped leadership teams integrate AI into operating models, workforce strategy, and organizational design.

  • Guided organizations through restructuring, acquisitions, and periods of significant change.