Fractional Practice Design

You’ve spent years building expertise that companies need, and now you’re selling it a slice at a time: two days a week, a quarterly retainer, an advisory seat. The work is the easy part. The terms are harder.

How do you scope a role that’s half strategy and half “can you also just handle this”? What should your rate be once you’re covering your own health insurance, retirement and the months between engagements? Do you take equity, and on what vesting? And how do you show clients your skills are current at a time when they’re wondering whether AI could do part of your job?

Most independent professionals make up these terms one deal at a time. This package builds them once, deliberately.

This is a fit if you:

• Are going fractional, advisory or independent, or you already are and your terms feel improvised

• Suspect you’re underpriced, overscoped or both

• Aren’t sure how to price in the benefits and stability you gave up when you left employment

• Get equity offers and don’t know what’s reasonable or how vesting should work

• Need a clear way to show clients that you work fluently with AI, rather than competing with it

Also for founders: if you’re on the other side of the table and deciding which roles to staff full-time, fractionally or on contract, this package produces a staffing map instead of an offering one-sheet.

Why work with me. I’ve worked fractionally and as an advisor myself for 30+ organizations, and I co-founded Optionality, a community for experienced professionals building careers on their own terms. Through Candor Partners I’ve also designed fractional structures from the company side, so I know what clients will push back on and what they’ll pay for.

Not quite right?

• If you’re still deciding whether to go independent at all, start with the Founders & Independent Practitioners open session.

• A completed one sheet for your fractional offer, covering:

  • the scope of the role and what’s excluded

  • a benefits-equivalent premium, so your rate reflects what you no longer get as an employee

  • vesting or equity terms, where they apply

  • proof of current capability, including how you work with AI

• Founders: in place of the term sheet, a staffing map showing which roles to fill full-time, fractionally or on contract.

• Three working sessions, with my review of your drafts between them.

Why it matters: improvised terms lead to underpricing and scope creep. A clear term sheet signals that you run your practice like a business.

1. Book your package. After booking, you’ll schedule three sessions over two to three weeks.

2. Complete the intake. Tell me what you offer, who you sell to, and how you price today. Founders: tell me the roles you’re trying to fill.

3. Send your materials 48 hours before Session 1. This could be a current proposal, a rate card, a LinkedIn profile or a draft offer.

4. Session 1: Scope (60 min). We define the role you’re selling: what it includes, what it excludes, and who it’s for.

5. Session 2: Terms (60 min). We set your premium, your vesting or equity terms, and how you’ll show current capability.

6. Between sessions: I review your draft term sheet and send you written feedback.

7. Session 3: Finalize (60 min). We pressure-test the terms against a real or likely client.

8. Receive your finished one-sheet or staffing map within [5] business days.

I’ve spent my career where a new technology meets the people expected to absorb it.

In 2005 I co-founded BlogHer, when blogging was still new and social media norms untrusted and untested. We built frameworks for trustworthy engagement, which I've done with emerging tech ever since. I’ve led global marketing teams at AWS and ConsenSys (blockchain), and in 2024 I co-founded Optionality, a community for experienced professionals exploring new models for work and meaningful careers. I started my career in traditional media (Time Inc, The New York Times Syndicate, Penguin), writing for national publications such as Fast Company and Inc.

Today, through my advisory practice Candor Partners, I work with leaders on a problem I call structural lag: Organizations deploy AI faster than their people and institutions are ready to absorb it. Human Agency Architecture (HAA) is the framework I built to close that gap. It gives leaders a practical way to decide what AI should handle, what people must keep deciding, and how to protect the judgment and development their organizations depend on.

I also convene the AI Operators Exchange, a private working group of senior enterprise operators, and I advise AI organizations on Narrative Positioning and GTM.

Read and connect

• Substack: The Architecture of Work

• Optionality

• LinkedIn