All Things Fractional: Your Complete Guide with Karina Mikhli

Brett Trainor (: 00:01

Hi, Karina, welcome to the Corporate Escapee Podcast. It's good to have you.

Karina (: 00:05

Thank you. Thank you for having me, finally.

Brett Trainor (: 00:07

Yes, I know and that's 100 % on me. So I think we met back at what frac, John's Fractional Conference was that 2023? Is that two years ago? Or it wouldn't be three years ago now, is it?

Karina (: 00:20

No, I think this is the third one. yeah, so two years ago. my gosh.

Brett Trainor (: 00:25

Yeah. Which is kind of cool. That was the first time in that early part that I actually heard about or knew the term fractional and the audience will appreciate, right? I mean, I think I had stumbled into it doing it, but I didn't realize that's what it was, was called at the time. So yeah, it's definitely been a long time coming to have you on the podcast. I appreciate you coming on. Um, and I'm give the audience a chance or give you a chance to explain to the audience what you're working now and what front is. Um, but the two things I really want to, you know,

Karina (: 00:32

Really?

Brett Trainor (: 00:55

go talk to you about today. One is your escapee journey, because I think it's interesting from when you escaped to what you're doing now is probably very different than what you thought. And then then two, let's get into all things fractional because I get questions all the time about fractional. So who better to answer those than the one running the largest community of fractional professionals. So if that sounds good to you, why don't you kick us off? us a little bit about what you are working on today. Then I'm going to take you back in time a little bit.

Karina (: 01:02

Yeah.

Karina (: 01:22

Sure. So I'm Karina Mickley. I'm the founder of Fractionals United, which is a large, engaged, supportive community for current and aspiring Fractional leaders. I'm still a Fractional COO and workflow consultant myself, and I'm also the Fractional COO for the FLA, which is the Fractional Leadership Alliance. So it's the Association for Fractionals.

Brett Trainor (: 01:48

That's awesome. How many members do you have today?

Karina (: 01:51

We're somewhere between, I think around 15, I lose track. We have a little bit of churn, we're still finding our place. And it's a startup like anything else, right? We're figuring it out, but we think it's important. And unlike Front, it's targeted towards larger companies, So that communities, marketplaces, fractional allies, et cetera, so that we can...

collectively do more for the good of the industry. So we're trying to figure things out like any other startup.

Brett Trainor (: 02:27

That's my world in a nutshell, right? Every day is a little bit different and I tell people it's like riding the wave. I'm not 100 % sure where the wave's going. I'm just trying to stay upright and make sure we're heading in the general direction that makes sense.

Karina (: 02:34

yes.

Karina (: 02:42

The best analogy someone shared with me, it's like flying a plane while also fixing it. So you're hoping you don't crash?

Brett Trainor (: 02:48

Yeah.

Yeah, I had a boss that used to say, right, we're driving down the mile, driving down the road at 65 miles an hour while trying to pave it at the same time, right? Same thing. So they get it. So we're definitely going to get into that because I think it's interesting and you tapped into something with this community and we'll talk about that evolution a little bit. But let's go back to what we do and how long you've been out of corporate now.

Karina (: 03:13

I would say a decade, about a decade.

Brett Trainor (: 03:14

Okay, so one of the OGs of the escapees, you figured it out before for us. And when you left, was it, hey, I'm going to start this fractional thing, I'm going to become a fractional COO or what? Why you talk a little bit about how that how you left and how you got started.

Karina (: 03:34

So I will be honest, I was kicked out. wasn't, yeah, it wasn't something, ironically, between my husband and I, he was the one who was always more risk friendly and I was risk averse. Like I was willing to do the W-2 for benefits and stability, which ha ha, and know, pay time off and all of that. And he wanted to do the consulting thing. And ironically, I work for myself and he does W-2, but life happens, right?

Brett Trainor (: 03:40

Same.

Brett Trainor (: 03:55

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 04:03

All right.

Karina (: 04:04

So I was working in publishing, which like, you know, if you all recall Amazon and digital, you know, took us for a spin. So I spent two decades in publishing and just got tired of all the reorgs and layoffs. And I was senior enough that when things happen, you know, it's, middle management that, you know, is the first to get cut. So between each of those reorgs and layoffs, I would like,

Each of them was longer, you know, when I would start freelancing or project work or something to just make ends meet, still looking, right? And then the last one I fell into, what now would be called Fractional, but back then had no name through Upwork, believe it or not. Upwork was a viable option back in the day. So I got a job as a part-time business manager for a niche publisher. And you know,

Brett Trainor (: 04:51

No kidding.

Brett Trainor (: 04:55

Huh.

Karina (: 05:03

She liked the fact that I had the publishing background and could do ops and I was with her for almost a year and like I was still looking but like at some point I realized like I'm actually getting paid a good amount. I like this and I can do others. So I started looking for others and then at some point I just was like I'm going to keep doing this and stop looking for that. And then never looked back.

Brett Trainor (: 05:27

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 05:33

It made sense, right? back then, I'm assuming a lot of the early contacts or contracts came from your network or referrals. Upwork, yeah, that's crazy to me. I don't think Upwork did even, they're not even in that. Yeah, I didn't think so.

Karina (: 05:34

Yeah.

Karina (: 05:42

It was through Upwork, believe it or not.

I know.

Karina (: 05:52

It still exists, but now it's a race to the bottom. Like at some points, like they used to be, you used to be able to get well-paid jobs, right? There was the low rung bonds, but there were a lot of high level well-paid jobs there now. If they, if the range is so wide, like nobody's looking for that, they're looking for this. And if you apply on the higher range, what generally happens is they will.

Brett Trainor (: 05:55

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 06:15

Yeah.

Karina (: 06:21

book you for three weeks out and see if they can get someone cheaper and then cancel your interview if they can. Like that happened to me a couple of times and it was my husband that pointed out the pattern. I'm like, okay, I'm done. I'm done. Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 06:32

Interesting. Yeah. mean, I'm definitely a big believer in your network and referrals for getting these and we'll get into that later. Kind of some best practices, but all right. So now you're off on your journey of fractional where they've been, though it's not called fractional yet. Where did that go? Right? When did you get the idea that there's, did you think there was more like you and you wanted to get people together? But how did the idea for the community start to form?

Karina (: 06:37

Yes, absolutely. Yes.

Karina (: 07:00

So I, one of my fractional, well, there was a client that I started with as a workflow consultant, which is pure project-based, right? Automation, optimizing that kind of stuff. I happened to mention in passing that I do fractional COO work. She just started referring to me as her COO. I'm like, okay, what? Fine, let's renegotiate, but okay. And then long story short, I actually went.

Brett Trainor (: 07:10

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 07:21

Hahaha

Karina (: 07:30

full time with them for a period, which happens sometimes, right? You know, if it's the right time, the right people, you know, they needed more help. I really enjoyed working with them. So I did that. And then January, 2023, I was back in the markets. You know, what also happens on the flip side is that once, you know, once we put the systems and people in place, we're too expensive full time for the longterm, right?

Brett Trainor (: 07:33

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 07:59

Right, right.

Karina (: 08:00

so I was back.

in the marketplace, looking for fractional work, realized a couple things. One, it was gaining popularity, but it also seemed lonely and harder. Now I know why I did impact them, that I was like, where are my people? So I was like, where are my people, right? Because I had joined some really great online communities during COVID. I'm an introvert by the way, so online communities is my sweet spot because it's so much easier than in person.

Brett Trainor (: 08:19

Yes.

Brett Trainor (: 08:26

Yeah.

Karina (: 08:36

So I had this realization January 7th, 2023, which was a Saturday. I'm like, I need to find my people. Because obviously things have changed in the two years since the last time I did this. And I realized Upwork was no longer viable. So I'm like, OK, I don't want to figure this out on my own. I want to learn from people who've been doing this while I was out of the game.

and so that evening, Saturday evening, I went online, started searching, Googling. This was pre AI, so I couldn't go to perplexity. went to Google. Remember Google.

Brett Trainor (: 09:09

Yeah, yeah, is that funny we're saying that now, but yeah

Karina (: 09:14

I know, I know. And I couldn't find what I was looking for. Like I found pseudo communities, meaning communities that were either a pipeline for somebody's business, right, or behind a paid firewall or something, but they weren't like community for the sake of community, which is what I was looking for.

Brett Trainor (: 09:34

Right.

Karina (: 09:37

And I remember like, and I'm not cut out to sit around and just look for work. Like I need to feel like I'm doing something and looking for work is so hard and so draining. So I remember looking up at my husband, cause he was near here doing something and I'm like, what if I, what if I start a community and see there's interest? And he just shrugged, you know, he's like, yeah, whatever.

So I got the, I got the domain fractional united.com. And it's funny. He was the one that pointed out the unfortunate acronym. F you. After I bought the domain, which is why we go by from, because that is just not, yeah, it's not. Yeah. So I, you know, put up a simple landing page, created a very quick MVP Slack, messaged.

Brett Trainor (: 10:11

yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 10:17

yeah, yeah, yeah.

Karina (: 10:29

on LinkedIn and some of my communities just to see if there was interest. This was literally just a test. By the end of that first weekend, over 50 people were like, yes, please, yes, please. And in the two years and two months, no, it was a little longer. In the two years and four months until we were free, we went from zero to 15,100 members.

Brett Trainor (: 10:54

It's remarkable, just remarkable.

Karina (: 10:57

And then in the end of May, we went paid, but very affordable, $10 a month or $100 a year, just because I hadn't paid myself in two years and I have a team and it's just not sustainable doing it for free.

Brett Trainor (: 11:11

Right. Interesting. Yeah. And we can get into that, that conversion a little bit too, because I think everything is the same thing, right? When I was, I took more of the GenX route and like, there's gotta be others that are looking to get out of corporate. And what do we do, right? We don't want to build a full on company and do these other things. And it would, took me a little longer to find that community, but the beauty of it was, you know, I got connected with you, obviously John.

Karina (: 11:25

Yeah. Yeah.

Karina (: 11:39

Yes. Yes.

Brett Trainor (: 11:40

Fahim Musa who runs a community for solo consultants. Right. So I started to get connected with a lot of these other cool, but again, I'm like, or maybe you knew what you were doing from the beginning, but I had no idea what to do with a community. Mine was just out of, got a, I'm having great conversations with people and they're connect on LinkedIn. And they would just kind of disappear the way LinkedIn does. like, you know what? I'll just start a Slack group to house people until we can figure out what we, we want to do. But yeah, it's,

Karina (: 11:44

So cool.

Karina (: 12:00

Yep.

Brett Trainor (: 12:09

That's remarkable, the number of people. And because I think that term was still, well, it definitely knew, right, the education process. Was there an education piece with folks or was it just people that were already out and looking to go fractional? What was kind of the early stages of the community?

Karina (: 12:30

Well, when it was just me, myself and I, wasn't as selective. And also I hadn't realized that people were misusing the term. So I was just looking for people who had it on their LinkedIn and not looking further. But I think I quickly realized that, like you said, people are

Brett Trainor (: 12:41

yeah.

Karina (: 12:51

there's an education piece and actually I created fractionaldefine.com to help that. Anyone can use it, refer to it, because as an ops person I get tired of anything that I find myself doing again and again. I always look to optimize and I was tired of answering the same questions over and over. So I created fractionaldefine.com.

Brett Trainor (: 13:15

That's a really good idea. I and you had mentioned it, but I've forgotten that you actually had created that. I'm pulling it up right now so I can, I'll put in the show notes for people as well.

Karina (: 13:23

Cool. But yeah, it's so it's both for current fractional leaders and senior leaders considering or aspiring to go fractional. And we do now select very carefully that for senior leaders because the way we define fractional leadership is it's an embedded senior leadership role. It's not just a part-time role. It's not an individual contributor. Like all of that.

Brett Trainor (: 13:34

yes.

Karina (: 13:51

is valid, but that's not what fractional is. The whole concept of fractional is that because we're not the ones executing, we're the ones leading and strategizing, and we have the experience to do this because we've done this full time, we can come in and do it effectively part time.

Brett Trainor (: 14:07

Yeah. Which again, I'd rather take, you know, three of you than one full-time junior level higher of what you'd be spending for that, that same time. mean, to me, the math just the ROI, makes way too much sense. So I think we're heading towards this picking, but I think you're right on the, the job title again, because I get people like, I thought people just put fractional when they're unemployed, looking for work. I'm like, I'm sure they probably do, but that's not right. It's, mean, it's part of the.

Karina (: 14:17

Yeah.

Karina (: 14:35

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 14:37

process and you know, I do get a lot of the times too, well, what, where's the job board for fractional? I'm like, well, we got some folks that are creating that, but I'm like, honestly, you have a better chance just through networking than you do through a job board right now. So, so maybe a good time to get into, mean, you've seen it all, right? So the, the, the, you know, the expert in fractional. what are.

Karina (: 14:38

Yeah.

Karina (: 14:49

Yes.

Yes.

Karina (: 14:58

Hahaha!

Brett Trainor (: 15:03

So again, lot of this audience are probably still sitting in corporate and you know, they're done, right? They don't want to do this. It's either going to quit on them like it did for us, or they're going to just get to the point that they don't want to do this anymore. So what are you had mentioned, which I liked on that the website, by the way, you break down fractional consultant, interim advisor, right? Very, that's super helpful. What are some things that you found the most successful one yourself as a fractional?

Karina (: 15:14

Right.

Brett Trainor (: 15:32

Let's maybe start with that, right? What are the skill sets that you should be thinking about? then two kind of, well, let's start with there. we'll go.

Karina (: 15:41

Okay. So I think it's really important, you know, just to touch back on what we said, this is not something you just promote yourself into, right? Like you need to have done this full time to be able to do it well, hard time, right? So if you were a CMO, yes, you can call yourself a fractional CMO, right? But you're not like, no one is going to keep you on the job and pay you what fractals get paid to figure it out. This is not a figure it out.

Brett Trainor (: 15:50

Great.

Karina (: 16:11

kind of job, right? This is like been there, done that, expert at it, can do it well, you know, hit the ground running. And you do it through a team, you do it through the resources, right? That's why it's a senior leader. And unlike consultants or all the others, you're embedded, you're part of the team, right? So you have to be able to figure out all of the stuff. And I would say treat it like an interview and not a proposal because you need to be sure

that the person hiring you is going to trust you, understands, set expectations. So really treat it like a job because even though it's part-time, you are part of the team and you will be accountable and have responsibility. It's not a project. It's meant to be long-term. Second, you're going to have to figure out taxes, know, probably incorporating, you know, having an accountant.

You know, juggling a pipeline plus doing the work, figuring out, can you afford to take time off? Cause no one's going to pay you for it. Benefits, all those things, right? It's different. I'm not saying it's better or worse, right? It's different. So understand what you're getting into because you're not going to have one thing. You're always going to have several things you have to juggle. And it's really important to go into this and knowing that.

And like figuring out a system that works for you. For me, it's time blocks. I live by time blocks. You know, I have, I use Savvy Cal and I have scheduling links that coincide with time blocks. You know, one for just networking, one for the community, one for a client. You know what I mean? You have to, you have to set expectations upfront. Don't do hourly, do retainer. You know, I do weekly cause I run the company, right?

Brett Trainor (: 17:57

Yeah.

Karina (: 18:06

But whatever works, whether it's daily, weekly, monthly, you're there for outcome and results, not hourly, you know? And everything has to be spelled out, upfront, expectations set, and you know, no surprises. The other thing I would say is that it isn't for everyone. You know, there are, there is another option.

Like if you're done with corporate or corporate is done with you and you really don't want to do that, you can join an agency. There are a lot more fractional and other agencies growing, right? Where you give them a percentage because they take care of the backend and the lead gen for you and you just do the work. So that is an option too. You know, and more, I think more of those, like there are lots of them and I think there will be more of those because not everybody is built to do the thing, right?

Brett Trainor (: 19:01

Right.

Karina (: 19:02

And that's fine, just know going in you're going to give up a percentage. And if that's fine, that's fine.

Brett Trainor (: 19:08

Yeah, no, it makes sense. it's good to have you on to clarify some of this because again, the folks get tired of hearing me talking all the time because yeah, because I'm, definitely take more of the generalist role. And again, I probably use fractional too loosely at times, because one of the things I'll tell folks that if you weren't, and maybe I'd need a better term for it. If you weren't like a CMO of a company, but in small businesses,

These companies need help building something, right? Whether, I mean, you can go down to a CRM, they need to come in and bring you in on a fractional basis, but it's maybe not fractional leadership, right? You're developing this thing. They need this skillset or they need an on a customer success program, right? So you're building something. Yeah. Yeah, true. But again, there's still more of a leadership aspect because they're bringing you in to lead it. So I.

Karina (: 19:41

Yes.

Karina (: 19:49

Right.

Karina (: 19:56

That's just a consultant. That's just consulting.

Karina (: 20:06

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 20:07

Again, I'm excited. It's good to get you on and straighten me out because I don't want to confuse folks.

Karina (: 20:15

I would say like I've, I've been a fractional COO that's done zero to one, right? That built and hired and all of that. And that's fine. If the, if the goal is to eventually not be in the day to day and lead a team, it's fractional, but if it's just build it and move on, that's definitely consulting, right? Even, even if like in the project, there is some leadership aspect to it. If it's short-term and project-based, it's straight on consulting.

Brett Trainor (: 20:31

Okay.

Brett Trainor (: 20:44

Right. Yeah, that makes sense. And it's probably a better fit for some people to your point, right? It's interesting. Interesting, interesting. And again, you mentioned some of these agencies, there any offhand you can think of that? I know I'm going to get in the comments. Well, what are some of these agencies? Because people are going to look at, even though you and I will talk for 10 minutes about the power of referrals and networking.

Karina (: 20:50

Yeah. Yeah.

Karina (: 21:09

Right.

Brett Trainor (: 21:12

they're going to say, is that agency? So I don't know if you've got any off hand that you recommend, if not.

Karina (: 21:17

No, I know that some of them are like members of the FLA, so you can look to see who the members are there. But I'm sure if you go to Perplexity or Google and look for it, they're out there.

Brett Trainor (: 21:32

Makes sense. All right. So let's come back to the deal structure. You said not hourly. You definitely want to go on retainer. And again, it's still one of the number, and I'm sure you get this question all the time from newbies as well. How do I price it and not get into the hourly conversation? And you know, what's, what's, what's a good way to think about this? If I'm working with a business owner, yeah, they want to bring me on as their fractional chief revenue officer. what's the best way to.

Karina (: 21:37

Yes.

Karina (: 21:56

Nice.

Brett Trainor (: 22:00

I know there's more than one way to structure a deal, how do you approach this? How would you think about it?

Karina (: 22:06

So I've seen different ways. I think there is a little bit of variation from function to function, as well as your level of experience, right? Like if you've been doing this for 20 years versus five years, right? And if you've been a fractional for longer, I would start with what would be a full-time salary. Add, I think, 30 %?

Brett Trainor (: 22:32

Okay.

Karina (: 22:36

And then break it down into.

Karina (: 22:47

Like I've seen different like, you know, 50 weeks, let's say, and see what that comes. And then, you know, that is a good starting point. There's actually a really good book. It's not new. It's been around for a while by Ben Wolfe called Fractional Leadership. And he goes into a formula and I think he actually differentiates from function to function. And John probably has something in one of his books too.

Brett Trainor (: 22:51

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 23:02

Okay.

Brett Trainor (: 23:13

I'll to go back. I'll find it for the show notes. Yeah.

Karina (: 23:15

Yeah. But I would say like work backwards because basically you need to be able to cover costs, right? So what is a good salary for you? And then at 30 % because you're going to have to pay your taxes and your admin and overhead and whatever. So that is where that comes from. And then like if you belong to any community, ask people. Like we have this, you

people are asking this conversation all the time, you know, or people are asking this question like, you know, what do you, some people won't, you know, share exactly, but there are enough people that feel comfortable giving a range and there have been like surveys out there. And so I would say start there and then whatever community you belong to, ask people, you know, make connections, right? Make friends. Like if you have a relationship with someone, they're more likely to give you the,

Brett Trainor (: 24:06

Validated.

Karina (: 24:13

the exact number and guide you than if you're just a stranger. So lean on your people.

Brett Trainor (: 24:17

For sure. Yeah. And then, so if we get that in the ballpark and again, I tell people if the first role, it's okay if you undercharge a little bit because you'll learn and figure out what the worth is. But if we're introducing this to a business owner, that's maybe newer to the term fractional. Do you position it as eight hours a week? What's kind of the, is there an industry? What would you say is, is there a norm or something that I should be using as baseline?

Karina (: 24:25

yeah. Yeah.

Karina (: 24:47

That definitely varies from function to function. I know like the marketers and finance people tend to do days or half days. So X amount and then they totally focus on, well, the marketers totally focus on results. The finance people have a little bit combination because obviously their times of the year they have to be more involved and there's like quarterly reviews and whatnot. For revenue,

Brett Trainor (: 24:49

Okay.

Karina (: 25:16

You know, there's, there's, it also depends if it's percentage commission on top of base and you know, all of that and how quickly you need to GTM and whatnot. Ops, I have a three to one model because I run the business. I do weekly retainers. So I start out with the three is like for the first three to six months, it's up to three hours a day, 15 hours a week, because I spend a lot of time first.

getting to know the business, what's working, what's not, talking to everyone before I make recommendations. Then most of the engagement is at the two level, which is up to two hours a day and 10 hours a week. And I stay there till everything is running smoothly. And then maintenance is the one level, which is up to one hour a day and five hours a week. So that works for me because I have to be involved daily, right? Like I manage the team and the ops and whatnot, everything.

So I know there are other ops people that do it differently, right? So it's, that's why it's so, which is also nice. You can figure out what works for you and what works for your client, but it really depends on what you do and how you can be the most effective, right? Like there's no way an ops person can't be, or at least a fractal COO can be involved daily until it's like in maintenance, right? Because everything comes to me, everything, you know,

Brett Trainor (: 26:27

Right.

Karina (: 26:44

troubleshoots to me or gets escalated to me.

Brett Trainor (: 26:48

Yeah, no, I think that makes sense. And it's the beauty of this is there at the flexibility and every client. That's why I said you gotta almost, you mentioned that thing of as a job interview. think that's spot on because when I tell people for the first time, when you're networking or talking with the potential business owner about helping them solve their problem, right? There's, you don't have to put a wrapper on it before you have the conversation you can hear based on what you've been doing for 25 years.

Karina (: 26:51

Yeah.

Karina (: 27:11

No.

Brett Trainor (: 27:15

One, can I help this business owner solve this problem? Two, how big is it? How much time am I going to have to spend doing it? To your point, is this a project or is this something that's going to be ongoing? And then start to structure a deal. think that people get so hung up on, is it eight hours? Is it 10 hours? Is it this? it's, it's good to have, I love that you've created a model and everybody should create their own model, that this is the way I work. This is the best way to do this. And,

Karina (: 27:21

yeah.

Karina (: 27:38

yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 27:42

Yeah, again, I think we make it over complicated sometimes.

Karina (: 27:45

100 % and people like You know, even if you're not an ops person simplifying it makes it more relatable and memorable And Again like I just want to stress like You should be interviewing them as much as they interview you because you're coming in for really important role and Reputation is everything you don't want to take on something that

A, you cannot do. B, they won't let you do. We've all had like CEOs that can't get out of their way to save their life. Right? Yeah. And it's something you want to do, right? Because it's so like, if you have bills to pay, like I've taken jobs or I've taken projects, right? And clients.

Brett Trainor (: 28:25

Right, right, right.

Karina (: 28:42

that in other circumstances I wouldn't have and stayed longer because I had bills to pay. We've all been there, but it's different when you go in there knowing that, you know, than when the rose colored glasses and being like, oh, this is my dream client when it's not.

Brett Trainor (: 28:58

Right. And I think you need to trust your instincts a little bit on this too. And the other thing I would warn, maybe not warn, but if you do need the money, maybe not pursue the fractional. If you can find the right fractional where it's the right role, yes, you get along with the team, you see their vision, you know you can help. Those are the ideal.

Karina (: 29:03

100%.

Brett Trainor (: 29:23

Otherwise, if you could get the consulting or some smaller short term where you know you can help them do that, but you're not sure you're going to fit with the other leaders, then again, it's funny. Trust your instincts. I didn't do that for longest time and it ended up in some awkward, I can make this work. If you see the red flags, like I said, if you have to take it, maybe structure a different deal. It's a little shorter term that gives you some flexibility.

Karina (: 29:26

Yes. Yes.

Karina (: 29:33

Yes.

Karina (: 29:49

Or try, or you could structure it as try to buy, right? Like if you're not sure, you can be like, let's start this as a project, you know, for X amount of time with this scope and see how we work together. And if it works out, then on the other end, you know, it could be long-term X.

Brett Trainor (: 30:07

Yeah, then make yeah, like that try to buy it. mean, land and expand, right? Well, however you want to phrase that. Alright, so let's flip to the business side, right? Because we talked about there still needs to be more education and small business owners. I mean, to me, it's it's a perfect match, right? The experience they need with small businesses that can't afford to do it full time. So are you seeing from you and your members, right? What's again, there's not a one business that fits all but

Karina (: 30:11

They do it with us all the time. Yeah. Yeah.

Karina (: 30:22

Yep. Yep.

Brett Trainor (: 30:37

Is there some, who should we be targeting? If I'm starting to do the networking, it, do the business owners understand what fractional is or do you have to explain the concept to them?

Karina (: 30:48

Unfortunately, there's still a lot of explaining. would say SMBs are prime targets. Some startups like, but it really depends. The bootstrap ones more so than the VC backed ones. Some VCs are all for this, others are not. So it really depends on who's funding them, right? Because if their VC is, you know, wants hit counts or whatever and doesn't believe in fractional, there's no way you're going to get there.

I know that there are some fractionals that have great success in establishing relationships with accelerators and incubators, but that's a long play. Like it's not going to be, you know, right away, but you know, people have become Tech Star mentors and other things and eventually maybe. the early days of Fron, I thought that...

You know, VCs were made great partners, but a fractional CTO explained to me that they want like two or three fractionals per function. They don't want a whole Rolodex, right? Like they want their tried and true that they can always refer back to. And if they ever run out, they have HR people and recruiters, you know, hunting there. They're not interested in a directory. so that's why it's a long play, you know, like if you've worked for.

And I would say for the people considering this, like start laying the foundation now when you still have a paycheck, right? You know, obviously be discreet, but you know, like start laying the foundation now because especially if you work for startups with partners, you know, those, those are people that you can go back to on the other side. Right. So start thinking about long-term now and who you know, and who the

Brett Trainor (: 32:19

Yes.

Karina (: 32:40

The best way to do this is find others who target the same people you're going to target. Right. So definitely know who your ICP is, right? Your ideal client profile or customer profile or whatever you want to say that ICP stands for. I learned this the hard way niche down. Like I've worked across many industries, but all my marketing friends are niche, niche, niche. You know, you got to be memorable. If you do everything for everyone, nobody's going to ever remember you.

Brett Trainor (: 33:06

Right.

Karina (: 33:10

So pick like two or three max, you know, niches and then find people in your network who either target the same niches or partner with the same niches, right? Because like I have brought in fractional CMOs and CFOs, right? So knowing others in the professional service industry are great because we can refer work to each other. You know, think of like SAS, right? And others who...

Like I'm constantly like recommending tools, optimizing tools, bringing in tools. So think about who else is already where you want to get and make connections with them.

Brett Trainor (: 33:51

Yeah. Interesting. I think that makes perfect. Yeah, definitely it started now. It doesn't hurt to have conversations because everything we learned in corporate was networking to find our next job. Now it's thinking about what you want to do again in hindsight, 2020. I didn't do that. Right. I started cold. you don't need to.

Karina (: 34:05

me neither. Yeah, yeah. And it's a long play. Like, if you start this with a gimme, gimme, gimme, you're gonna get nowhere.

Brett Trainor (: 34:18

Right, 100%.

Karina (: 34:20

Like you really, like that's what communities are great because you can find people that you have interest with. And even there, like you have to really want to find people you want to spend time with. Find people you have things in common with, you know, cause you need to trust them and they need to trust you because again, it's your reputation once lost. Good luck. So if you refer someone who doesn't do a good job, it's on you.

Brett Trainor (: 34:33

Yes.

Karina (: 34:49

No one's going to trust you again. So you need to get to know them, right? And the same way you can't expect someone to refer something to you if they don't know you and trust

Brett Trainor (: 34:49

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 35:00

Yeah, it's all about the relationships and developing it. And the beauty is, and maybe we're offline, talking about this, there's a lot of opportunity. There's opportunity for everybody out there, right? This isn't like it's so saturated that we're fighting for the same. No, there's again, as business owners get smarter and understand the ROI of this, you're going to see more and more, but might as well get out in front of it now while, right. It's like I said, it takes a little more on the educational standpoint, but it makes sense.

Karina (: 35:23

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 35:29

curious from also from your perspective, right? I found companies with revenue down to 2 million annual revenue are open to bringing in fractional. Like I said, my smallest company was 2.1 million and it was a chief revenue officer fractional for them. So are you seeing a sweet spot in the SMB industry? there? When does it get too big to get where it gets complicated? Maybe.

Karina (: 35:51

I

Karina (: 35:54

Right. I look at it more from a head count just because I'm an ops person. And to me, it's about teams. Like there needs to be a team for it to make sense to bring me in. So that's why I say 10 plus employees, right? If you can't afford 10 employees, it's too soon to bring in a fractional COO. I would say probably the sweet spot, I think is 10 to a hundred employees, maybe sometimes to 250 or 500, but after 500, you probably need full time.

Brett Trainor (: 36:03

Right.

Brett Trainor (: 36:08

Okay.

Brett Trainor (: 36:26

Yeah, it makes sense. Cause one of the things I've been, I was actually on your panel where I was talking about, but maybe I didn't bring this up, but I've been, you know, on the bandwidth, under 10 million, you don't need a full-time employee, right? Unless they're an equity person, right? Or it, there's too many specialists now that you can bring in consultants, advisors that are happy to like to do these jobs, right? If it's not in your core competence of the business and you're not big enough for full-time.

Karina (: 36:30

Yes.

Karina (: 36:41

Yeah.

Karina (: 36:46

yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 36:55

where you can hire the right person. You know, we've, there's people with experience out there that, that want to do these jobs. know it's, it's a changing landscape and, but the companies that the one I example I use all the time, I had the CEO of lettuce.co there. And when he was on the podcast, it was, I think they had 41, they weren't employees, 41 people, all 41 of the staff were fractional or freelancers. He brought them on because he's like,

Karina (: 37:09

Mm.

Karina (: 37:21

Awesome.

Brett Trainor (: 37:23

the talent density that I can get from a fractional is 10x what I would be able to get if I had to bring everybody full time. He did say over time, some people did transition into full time because they wanted to, but it wasn't a requirement from him as part of this. I'm like, he gets it, right? He sees where it goes. So, all right, wow. Go ahead.

Karina (: 37:40

Of course, yeah. The thing no- the thing nobody talks about is like all those years when I was W2, it would take me 9 to 12 months to optimize my job and then I had so much free time I was bored. And they're paying!

for me to sit around and be bored.

Brett Trainor (: 38:05

Yeah, you're in the lucky roll. In some cases, they're paying you for the 30 % of the time you're actually doing the job they brought you in to do, right? Because you're doing fire drills or other ads. It's just a mess. Sooner or later, big corporate's going to figure out what a waste that this model is. But until then, it's more for folks that want to go solo and take their own. So man, time's flown by. So I want to be respectful, Karina, of your time. So anything.

Karina (: 38:16

Yeah.

Karina (: 38:21

yeah. Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 38:33

We didn't touch on anything other best practices or red flags that folks considering fractional should think about.

Karina (: 38:43

So just to reiterate, you know, if you are in the position to start before you have to do that, if not, you don't only have to do one thing, right? You can be fractional and a consultant and an advisor and whatever, you know, even a startup founder. Like that is the beauty of this world is that you can create the perfect puzzle of all the pieces that make you and, and hopefully

you know, more than make enough money eventually, but that lights you up, right? Like you can, you can fire someone who isn't appreciating you. You can do more or little and like flex and make the life that gives you time to live and time to contribute.

Brett Trainor (: 39:15

Yeah.

Brett Trainor (: 39:32

Yeah, no, I think it's, so true. And again, the thing I always tell people by love about the fractional position is it's a good cornerstone, right? Cause if you get the rent right company, it's a longer term, it's well paying. It just builds a bunch of runway. But I also believe in, like you said, stacking some of the smaller opportunities until you can find it. And you may find you like the smaller ones than the longer term. So it's a big, bad world out there, but you have to get started. You have to network and.

Karina (: 39:43

yeah. Yep.

Karina (: 39:51

yeah.

Karina (: 40:01

Yep.

Brett Trainor (: 40:02

By the way, do, if you're listening to this podcast, you've probably, if you've been doing something for 25 years, you probably have the skillset. I know you, right. I always say they're paying you to do a job. Then there's room for you in the, you're at the solo world. So, um, all right, Karina. So what's the best way if folks want to connect with you, learn more about your community, all the good stuff. What's the, what's the best way.

Karina (: 40:24

So I'm on LinkedIn if you want to connect with me personally. If you want to join Fractionals United, just go to FractionalsUnited.com and there's a short application there. And yeah, that's basically it.

Brett Trainor (: 40:38

Awesome. And every time I still hear fractionally, I still think of football club first, but that's all right. That's what's the beauty of the title. It's, uh, it's, it's so catchy. So Karina, thank you so much for coming on. I appreciate it. Like I said, it's my fault that you haven't had you on sooner, um, with what your expertise is, but I'll make sure that you're not a stranger. So you're welcome back anytime. So if you've got new developments, you see things changing in the diffractional world, you are always welcome to come back and share with us.

Karina (: 40:50

Thank you.

Karina (: 40:59

Awesome.

Karina (: 41:07

Awesome. Are you going to be at Frac this year?

Brett Trainor (: 41:09

I'm not this year just because everything that's going on with the escapee community. Um, but I did tell John, my, my goal is to get back there in 2026. Maybe someday he'll get it somewhere other in a warm weather place that, but, short of that, no, I, I, I highly encourage folks that are up there and you're thinking about it. It's, it's, it's, it's a great event. Um, really good people. I'm sure it's going to be huge this year too, cause it's grows every year. So.

Karina (: 41:13

Mmm.

Karina (: 41:23

I know, I know.

Karina (: 41:33

Yeah.

Karina (: 41:38

Yeah, I'll be there.

Brett Trainor (: 41:38

Awesome. Hopefully no snow this time. We won't jinx it. So all right, Karine, appreciate the time. Good luck with everything and we'll catch up with you soon.

Karina (: 41:43

Ugh,

Karina (: 41:51

Thank you. Thank you for having me.