How to prepare for, find and work with a fractional CGO

If you’ve never worked with a fractional member of your leadership team, you may have questions. If you’ve worked with a consultant or an external integrator before, you might have more questions. While there are differences in each role, the goals of all three should be aligned. The expectations and outcomes are not necessarily the same, but certainly aligned. Of the three, working with the Fractional Chief Growth Officer is probably the most unique.

Get your house in order

Hiring a fractional team member is not unlike hiring any other member of your team. The process is started by establishing what your needs are. The more specific you can be, the better. If you are a visual person, you may want to use a mind-mapping tool to help organize your thoughts and ideas. Keep in mind that at this stage, you are looking at issues that are facing the business, not creating a job description. This will help to provide foundation for your discussions as you are meeting with candidates.

Know your values. While it seems trivial, you will not be successful if there is not alignment between your values. This is no different than any relationship. Since you’ll be rolling up your sleeves with this person, it needs to be someone that you are going to like.

Documenting the vision, you have for the company will help with clarifying goals and will help the candidate align initiatives with the vision you have for the company. It may not be perfect. It may not fit into the “vision” box. It may be vague. However, put something down and indicate that this is an area you would like to clarify. If you don’t know where you are going, you won’t know if or when you’ve gotten there. Recommendation: Don’t be so specific that it limits the company’s potential. And where do you go once you’ve reached the horizon?

One thing that will work against you is trying to fix issues in your company before your CGO is hired. It is tempting, but the incumbent needs to understand how you lead, manage and run your company. There is nothing worse than getting blindsided by an issue that you were informed didn’t exist. If no one knows it’s broken, it won’t get fixed. Further, your CGO may have expertise or resources that can resolve the issue faster and better than you might.

You’ll want to be prepared to go through the entire company during the onboarding process, so organizing what you need to go over with the CGO will be helpful. Lastly, as a leader, you are going to need to be mentally prepared to give up some level of control. While the CGO shouldn’t work in a silo, they likely won’t be successful if they are unable to do the job they are hired to do.

Note that a good CGO will also understand your position and help to build a plan that will be respectful of your needs, but they will still push you to achieve the goals that are established.

Finding Fractional Chief Growth Officer Candidates

Looking for a fractional Chief Growth Officer is not like finding a freelancer. You DO NOT want a CGO that is a freelancer. You want someone who is going to be fully engaged in your company. You want someone who is going to be consistently responsive, willing to invest the time and effort to know your company and industry, and not be so bogged down with other clients that they cannot give your company the focused attention it needs.

Understand the scope of work you should expect from the CGO. They are generally not tactical. They are working at the leadership level and have eyes on the entire organization to ensure that there is nothing in the way of growth. While they will look at sales and marketing, they are also looking at finance, staff, culture, products and services, management and how the company is being led. So, if they don’t know how to run an email marketing campaign, update a website, run a trial balance or create job descriptions, that is fine because it is not where you want to focus their efforts.

Finding your CGO candidate is like finding an employee. With expectations in hand, clarity with respect to your values, and vision, you can start looking. Your network will be a good place to start. Getting recommendations from people you know and trust will be invaluable. However, you may have to resort to an old-fashioned Google Search. Both methods will leave gaps: Your network doesn’t know everyone in the world and not every CGO is going to show up on the internet. Hint: If the way the CGO shows up digitally doesn’t reflect what you are looking for, you can be pretty confident that they aren’t the right fit for your company.

The CGO Hiring Process

Unfortunately, the recommended approach and the “what you have the time, experience and expertise to do” may not be aligned. The recommended approach would be to conduct thorough interviews, check references, ensure that there is alignment between values and expectations, then negotiate terms and go forth.

In reality, your capabilities and capacity may limit the process or its effectiveness. As business leaders, it is imperative that we understand our weaknesses and we find the “who” that needs to get it done. That said, enlist people around you to assist with the process. Leverage the people who know you best and have your best interest in mind to help with the decision. Consider including a work / personality / ambition assessment as part of your process.

Most importantly, you’ll want to work together with the candidate that has been selected before finalizing your decision. My experience has been that you should know within 10 days if this person is going to be a good fit for your organization. I cannot recall an individual that I had a bad gut feeling about that my gut wasn’t wrong about.

Working with a fractional Chief Growth Officer

The fractional Chief Growth Officer you work with should be extremely driven, goal-oriented and take a system view of your organization. They should understand how the various parts of the business work together. They should think strategically with an understanding of how each decision will move the company closer to the vision you have for the company. They should be empathetic to your needs and those of your team but have clear understanding of making the best decisions for all.

Your CGO is a member of your leadership team and will need the authority, bandwidth and support to make the decisions that are needed to be made to move the company forward. They will likely ask you to make investments the company with a clear understanding of how the investment will move the company forward.

Their primary job is to increase revenue and ensure that the company’s infrastructure can support the growth. The growth should be sustainable with systems, processes and tools that will be there after the CGO is no longer with the organization.

They will require of you:

1. An effective onboarding process. They will need to be able to do a “deep dive” into how the company operates and truly understands it. While there will be “on the job” training, they need the bandwidth / leeway to learn the business so that they can help guide the right decisions.
2. Regular visibility and communication. The team needs to be comfortable with the CGO and willing to speak to them. The work that must be done isn’t done in a silo; it will take a team effort to drive the changes that will need to happen in order to support growth.
3. A collaborative environment. The team must be confident that everyone is rowing in the same direction. When companies go through rapid growth, the company culture often shifts. It will be important to model, monitor and equip the team to maintain the culture and values it should represent.
4. Ability to monitor performance. They will need the tools and access to the tools that will enable them to track growth, identify shortcomings, recommend and implement change. This may come by way of a BI tool, or an ERP system with adequate reporting. While spreadsheets can be a good place to start, it may prove difficult to manage change and keep information updated in a timely manner.
5. Authority to leverage their expertise. The company will benefit from the CGO’s strategic insights. Their external perspective can be invaluable in identifying new opportunities and overcoming challenges.

In Conclusion

Working with a Fractional Chief Growth Officer will be a game changer for your business, if you select the correct person, work with them, and give them the authority to do their job. Not only will it empower you to focus on running your company while someone else focuses on its growth and implementing the changes to support that growth, but you are no longer carrying the burden on your own. Finally, getting an external, objective perspective on what will enable your company to reach its financial goals will give you a broader perspective on what is possible.

Aepiphanni is a 19-year-old Business Consultancy dedicated to providing Fractional Leadership, Management Consulting, and Business Transformation to business leaders and entrepreneurs aiming to enhance or expand their operations. As a trusted advisor, we specialize in delivering forward-thinking operational and strategic solutions that empower our clients to navigate and overcome the challenges of business growth. Discover more about our services at Aepiphanni or schedule a complimentary discovery session at Coffee and a Consult.

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