A senior AI leader on retainer.
Without the $300K hire.
For 30–300 person companies that need a defensible AI strategy, a single point of accountability, and senior judgement on vendor decisions — but don’t need 40 hours a week of it. Strategy, governance, vendor selection and enablement on a fixed monthly fee.
Why fractional
Full-time AI leadership is the wrong shape for most SMBs.
A full-time CAIO is a $250K–$400K bet you can’t afford to get wrong.
A senior AI leader who actually moves the needle in a 30–300 person company is paid like a CFO. The hiring market is brutal: 6-month searches, 12-month ramps, and at least a 30% chance the person isn’t the right fit anyway. Most SMBs cannot underwrite that risk.
You don’t need 40 hours of AI leadership a week. You need 6.
AI strategy at the SMB scale is a high-leverage, low-volume job. Two board prep sessions a quarter, four vendor evaluations a year, monthly governance review, weekly check-ins with whoever is leading delivery — that’s the actual shape of the work for a 100-person company.
You need a single point of accountability — not a panel of vendors.
Without one senior voice owning the AI agenda, you end up with a stack of overlapping vendor pitches, ad-hoc tool purchases, and no defensible strategy when the board asks "what’s our AI plan?" A fractional leader closes that gap permanently.
What you get
Six things a fractional AI leader actually owns
Strategy
Quarterly AI roadmap + board narrative
A defensible 12–18 month AI plan refreshed quarterly. Output is a one-page roadmap, a board-ready narrative deck, and a prioritised opportunity backlog the leadership team aligns around.
Vendor selection
Tool evaluation + procurement support
When marketing wants a generative-AI tool, sales wants a CRM copilot, and IT is being pitched five different AI add-ons — we run the evaluation. Shortlist, demo scripts, ROI math, redlines, and a procurement pack the CFO can sign.
Governance
AI acceptable-use policy + risk register
A practical, lawyer-reviewed AI policy that doesn’t read like 40 pages of compliance theatre. Plus a living risk register, vendor due-diligence checklist, and quarterly review cadence.
Enablement
Internal capability building
We don’t want to be permanent. We coach an internal lead — a senior ops person, a head of digital, sometimes the founder — so that within 12 months your organisation has its own AI muscle and we’re back to once-a-month sparring.
Delivery oversight
Pilot scoring + scaling decisions
Every AI pilot in the company is reviewed on the same scorecard: time saved, revenue won, cost removed, risk reduced. Quarterly we decide what to scale, what to kill, and what to keep watching.
Cadence
Weekly office hours + monthly leadership review
A standing 30-minute weekly slot for whoever is leading delivery, plus a monthly 90-minute leadership review with the CEO, CFO and head of operations. Everything else is on Slack or email.
Retainer tiers
Three retainer shapes, no surprise scopes
Pricing is transparent on a fit call. We don’t sell anything you don’t need; most clients start on Standard and step down within a year as internal capability grows.
Light
4 hours / month
Pre-pilot SMBs who want a senior voice on speed dial.
- Monthly 90-min leadership review
- 1 hour of ad-hoc Slack/email per week
- Quarterly roadmap refresh
Standard
12 hours / month
SMBs running 1–2 active pilots and shopping vendors.
- Everything in Light
- Weekly 30-min delivery review
- Up to 2 vendor evaluations per quarter
- Quarterly board-narrative pack
Embedded
20 hours / month
SMBs treating AI as a board-level program.
- Everything in Standard
- Direct board attendance once per quarter
- AI acceptable-use policy + risk register ownership
- Internal-lead coaching program
First year
What the first 12 months actually look like
Week 1
Two diagnostic sessions. We walk your tech stack, talk to the operating leaders, and read the last two quarters of board decks. End-of-week: a one-page assessment.
Weeks 2–4
First roadmap draft. Three opportunities sized with worked ROI math. One vendor shortlist if you’re actively evaluating. We meet your senior team and lock the cadence.
Month 2 onwards
Standing weekly delivery review + monthly leadership review. Vendor evaluations as needed. Quarterly: a board-ready narrative refresh and a written progress report.
Month 12
Honest review. If your internal lead is ready, we step down to once-a-quarter sparring. If the program needs more capacity, we right-size up. Most engagements naturally taper after year one.
Honest fit check
Who this is for — and who it isn’t
Right fit
- 30–300 employees
- CEO/owner who genuinely wants AI on the agenda, not just press releases
- Already on Microsoft 365, Google Workspace, or Salesforce — not building from scratch
- Willing to point one internal person at this — even part-time
- Decisions made by ≤ 4 people; no 6-month committee cycles
Wrong fit
- You need a full-time engineer building agents — hire one, don’t retain us
- You’re hoping AI will fix a broken culture or broken processes
- You want a vendor-agnostic theorist who never gets their hands dirty
- Strategy decisions require ten stakeholders and three external committees
- You’re looking for a vendor-of-record to blame later
FAQ
Common questions
How is this different from hiring a fractional CTO?
A fractional CTO owns engineering. A fractional AI leader owns the AI agenda specifically — strategy, vendor selection, governance, ROI defensibility, and capability building. The two roles often coexist in a 100-person company.
Do you sign exclusivity?
No. We work with at most six SMB clients at a time on Standard or Embedded retainers, and we’re transparent about who else we’re working with so we never sit across the table from your direct competitor.
What’s the minimum commitment?
Three months for Light, six months for Standard and Embedded. Honest answer: less than three months and we won’t have learned enough to be worth what you’re paying us.
What if I just want one specific deliverable — like an AI policy?
Then a retainer is the wrong shape. We do fixed-scope deliverables (policy authoring, vendor RFPs, roadmap-only) as one-off engagements. See the AI Consulting page.
Will you talk to my board?
Yes — quarterly under Standard, monthly under Embedded. We prep with your CEO and CFO first so we’re reinforcing the leadership narrative, not freelancing it.
Senior AI leadership shouldn’t be a six-month hire.
Start with the free AI Readiness Assessment. If a retainer makes sense, we’ll talk on a fit call. If it doesn’t, you still walk away with a scored roadmap.