Fractional IT Director one or two days a week
Board-level IT leadership on retainer for UK SMEs that need senior oversight but can’t justify a permanent hire. Strategy, governance, supplier management, and the awkward technical decisions your MSP or internal team shouldn’t be making for you.
See if this fits →Most UK SMEs between £10m and £150m turnover have the same problem. The business is too big for whoever’s running IT on the side to keep doing it, but too small to justify a full-time IT Director on £100k-plus plus package. The result is an MSP running more of the strategy than anyone’s comfortable admitting, and a board that’s flying blind on technology risk. A fractional arrangement fixes that.
What fractional actually means
You get a senior IT Director on retainer for an agreed number of days per month. One or two days a week is typical. Some clients have me for half a day a week plus ad-hoc support during projects. It’s a rolling arrangement, not a contract you have to fight to get out of.
During my agreed days, I work as part of your leadership team, not as an outside consultant. I’ll attend SLT and board meetings where IT is on the agenda, and be the person your department heads go to when they’re thinking about new systems, suppliers or processes. Outside of my agreed days, I’m reachable by email for anything urgent.
Who this is for
- SMEs with no IT Director. You’ve got a manager and maybe an MSP, but nobody with real authority sitting between them and the board.
- Owner-managed businesses. The founder has been making IT decisions for years and wants to step out of that role without dropping it on someone who isn’t ready.
- PE-backed businesses. Investors want professional IT governance reporting in the board pack and a clear roadmap. A fractional does this for a fraction of the cost of a permanent CIO.
- Businesses coming out of an interim. If you’ve had an interim stabilise things, fractional is often the natural next step. You keep the oversight without paying for full-time cover you no longer need.
What I actually do on my days
The mix varies by client, but the core is always the same:
- Strategy and roadmap. Where should your IT spend be going in the next one, three, and five years? What’s non-negotiable, what’s optional, what can wait.
- Supplier and vendor governance. I hold your MSP, your software vendors, and your telecoms providers to account. I read the contracts. I attend the reviews. I flag when you’re being sold something you don’t need.
- Risk and compliance. Cyber posture, backup verification, DR arrangements, insurance questionnaires, GDPR. I make sure the board has a clear view of where the risks are and what’s being done about them.
- Board reporting. Monthly IT pack in language non-technical directors can act on. No jargon, no “traffic lights” that never change, no 40-slide decks.
- Decision support. When your FD, MD, or head of ops has an IT question (should we move to the cloud, should we replace this system, should we accept this quote), I’m the one they call.
- Project oversight. I’m not the project manager, but I’ll review the plan, challenge the suppliers, and make sure what gets delivered is what was scoped.
What a typical month looks like. Two agreed days each month or week, depending on the engagement, with stakeholder meetings, supplier reviews, board reporting and focused work on the priorities that matter. There will usually be one or two ad-hoc decision points over email, plus deeper work where needed on things like cyber, contract renewals, roadmap or supplier performance.
Why this works for SMEs
The honest answer: because the problem in most SMEs isn’t needing more hours of IT work, it’s needing better decisions about the work that’s already happening. A permanent IT Director costs £150k or more a year once you add NI, pension and package, whether there’s a strategic decision to make that month or not. A fractional retainer gives you senior-level thinking and accountability without carrying the cost of a full-time executive.
Fractional leadership gives an SME access to experience it may not need, or want to pay for, five days a week.
Commercials
Monthly retainer based on agreed days. Price fixed for the engagement period. Scope reviewed quarterly so we can scale up or down as your needs change. No minimum term beyond the agreed notice. If it’s not working you can exit, and so can I.
How a fractional engagement usually starts
We start with a conversation to understand what’s driving the need. If it looks like a fit, I’ll usually recommend a short, fixed-fee discovery review before committing to anything ongoing.
That gives me enough time to understand how IT is organised, where the main risks and opportunities sit, how suppliers are performing and what needs attention first. At the end, I’ll give you a clear view of what I see and what I’d recommend doing next.
If there’s value in continuing, we can then agree the right fractional arrangement. If there isn’t, you still leave with a useful independent assessment and clear priorities.