What is Fractional?
Haven’t heard of Fractional Operations? You’re not alone.
Fractional means you access a fraction of a senior executive’s time while gaining all of their expertise. It’s not a consultant who disappears after handing you a plan.
It’s not a junior hire who needs constant supervision. It’s something in between, and better than both.
A Fractional COO is embedded in your team, doing the work, staying accountable to results, and providing the kind of strategic operational leadership that larger organizations take for granted, at a cost your budget can actually handle.
The numbers make the tradeoff clear. A full-time Operations Director costs $80,000 to $120,000 a year plus benefits, brings senior-level expertise, but takes three to six months to onboard, carries high turnover risk, and needs no supervision.
A junior coordinator costs $40,000 to $55,000 plus benefits, but only entry-level expertise, the same three to six month onboarding, very high turnover risk, low strategic capacity, and requires ongoing supervision.
A fractional COO through The Neon Lighthouse runs $60,000 to $80,000 as a retainer. You get senior-level expertise, immediate onboarding, no turnover risk, high strategic capacity, and no supervision required.
This gives you senior-level operational leadership without the cost of a full-time hire, and without the supervision burden of a junior one.