September 25, 2025 • 44 mins
What happens when your business values collide with survival? In this Oh Frac! episode, host Adir Ron sits down with Steph Thommen, a fractional Head of People and product-minded CPO who turns HR into a growth engine. Steph breaks down culture as “how we do things around here,” not swag or beanbags—and explains why a 5–10% productivity lift can effectively extend a startup’s runway. We trace her path from CX leader to fractional people exec, landing first clients post-redundancy, and the realities of referrals vs. LinkedIn outreach. She unpacks a practical culture workshop (purpose → vision → mission → values → decision framework), tough value-based calls when capital dangles, “power hour” crisis fixes, and the difference between freelance and fractional. If you’re a founder scaling to Series A—or an aspiring fractional—this one’s packed with field-tested plays.
Key takeaways: * Culture = operating system: “how we do things,” not perks. * Small, compounding productivity gains (5–10%) extend runway meaningfully. * Fractional ≠ recruiter: hiring may be included, but the value is systems, managers, and a clean people stack. * First deals: referrals rule; LinkedIn outreach supports—but requires stamina and structure. * A simple culture blueprint: Purpose → Vision → Mission → Values → Decision-making rules. * Values should sting: the right ones cost you something—and guide hard investor decisions. * Define roles early; ambiguity kills speed as headcount grows. * Crisis “power hours” work: align policy, support people, and act fast (with empathy). * Freelance vs. fractional: project-to-project vs. embedded, ongoing leadership one day/week. * Dream clients put people first; nightmare clients manage by hearsay and fire lists. * Build your brand before going fractional: social proof shortens cycles. * New fractionals: plan 6–12 months runway and block weekly time for pipeline.
Chapters: 00:00 – Cold open: values vs. survival 04:00 – Meet Steph Thommen & the “real” meaning of culture 08:00 – From CX to people: the fractional pivot 12:00 – First fractional client, silence… then referrals 16:00 – Outreach on LinkedIn: love–hate and systems 20:00 – The culture workshop: purpose → decisions 24:00 – Values that cost you: saying no to misaligned money 28:00 – Firefights & “power hours” that de-risk chaos 32:00 – Fractional vs. freelance; dream vs. nightmare clients 36:00 – Tools, future of fractional, and advice to starters
Steph's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/startupsteph/
Adir’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adir-ron/
Keywords: fractional leadership, fractional CPO, head of people, startup culture, decision-making framework, purpose vision mission values, skills-first hiring, stronger managers, people ops, HR systems, runway extension, Series A readiness, founder advice, referrals vs outreach, LinkedIn prospecting, crisis management, power hour, freelance vs fractional, SaaS scale-up, VC, executive operating system, productivity, people stack, employer brand
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
What most founders find very difficult, and I think it's more most leader find really difficult, is the fact that aligning your behavior to your business values sometimes go against your personal values.
And when you have 2 months' runway and you have a, a big investor that comes and say, "Well, I give you the 3 million that you need to, to scale, but you have to do things our way," it's a very difficult decision.
(00:29):
If you think about it, culture is how do we do things around here?
It's not beer pong, it's not beanbags, it's not snacks.
It's how do we do things around here?
And it's working hand-in-hand with leadership teams to create the most effective culture possible so that you can use your resources the best way.
(00:50):
The startups are always constrained with resources, and if you improve productivity by 5 to 10%, then you've technically improved your runway by 5 to 10%.
So that's a, that's a big difference.
Steph is a fractional head of people, and a product-minded chief people officer who scales startups without the drama.
(01:10):
Steph turns HR into a growth engine, skills-first hiring, stronger managers, and a clean people stack that actually ships results.
From early-stage chaos to hypergrowth, Steph's the steady hand that's installing systems and rhythms that stick.
Welcome to Oh, Frack!, the podcast where top fractional leaders share their wins, struggles, and stories from the trenches, hosted by Adir Ron.
(01:36):
Welcome to Oh, Frack!, the podcast where we dive into the world of fractional leadership, the wins, the struggles, and everything in between.
I'm your host, Adir Ron, Fractional CMO.
And my guest today is Steph Thommen.
Hi, Steph.
.9999999999854Hi, Ron.
Thank you for joining me today.
A pleasure.
(01:58):
Pleasure's all mine.
.000000000014552So Steph is a fractional head of people, and a product-minded chief people officer who scales startups without the drama. 22 00:02:09,20.000000000014552 --> 00:02:17,648.0000000000291 Steph turns HR into a growth engine, skills-first hiring, stronger managers, and a clean people stack that actually ships results.
.0000000000291From early-stage chaos to hypergrowth, Steph's the steady hand that's installing systems and rhythms that stick.
(02:26):
Thank you.
.0000000000291So welcome, and thank you for joining me today.
And, uh, let's, uh, let's kick it off with a fun little icebreaker question.
Okay.
.0000000000291So
And, and I, I've been thinking, I always take some time to think of, like, a fun little interaction to, to kick off an episode.
And, uh, I've, uh, I've seen this interesting, uh, discussion a few days ago on, like, emojis that encompass an entire situation, an- an- an entire unraveling catastrophes in one emoji.
(02:59):
So can you think of a broken culture that you've experienced, um, and describe it with an emoji?
And which emoji would that be?
Ooh.
That's a hard one.
That's, I apologize.
I don't know.
(03:20):
Um
The one emoji would be the sick emoji, you know, the green one with the want to vomit.
.0000000000291That's what, that's what broken culture make me feel like.
Okay.
And it's how, if you speak with the staff who work within a broken culture, it's often how they feel.
(03:43):
They feel sick because they can't win.
There's no- nothing they can do to win.
Interesting.
I would imagine actually the, the dead one with the Xs for eyes, or the dazed one with, like, the, the spiraling, uh, spirals for eyes.
The one with the swear words as well.
That, that's a good one.
That's a great one, yeah.
.0000000000291I've had that at a couple of places, unfortunately, so, so yes.
(04:07):
All right.
So we, we, we figured out our emojis.
That's a great start.
So Steph, tell us a bit about your journey into fractional head of people. 54 00:04:18,420.0000000000291 --> 00:04:21,072 How, or you know, how, how the frack did you get here?
How the frack did I get here?
It, it's been a long and interesting journey.
So I started in, in customer service, in customer success, and I ended up leading teams in large call centers.
(04:33):
And what I found within those call centers is the fact that the more rigid the structure, the less initiative you see in the team members.
And that slows everything down.
Because there's no real initiative, the team members expect the management to solve everything, where they could be solving things with the customers themselves.
(04:56):
And that started a journey for me in understanding what makes people tick and how do you build a good team culture?
And I've been going between being freelancer fractional to, uh, being permanent with big businesses and startups.
(05:16):
And when I join a startup, I get an interesting project, and sometimes they ask me to stay, and if I really like the, the project, I stay, and then I go back to fractional after a while, after a while.
But the- So it's kind of like in and out.
It's in, in and out.
And I think, I think I've reached the point where I much prefer being fractional.
Okay, that's good.
Then you're at the right podcast.
(05:37):
So now, now I know exactly what I wanna do.
But it took, it took a while.
My journey from CX to people has been, well, if I can create great teams or, like
What I'm really strong at is creating great teams.
.0000000000582And if I can create great teams in CX or in operations, I can do that for the whole business and have a great impact.
(05:58):
So I worked for a startup called Nimbler.
Sadly, they, they closed now, but I started in CX, set up all of their CX and then moved into, into people as we scale, and I've stayed in, in people.
But then
And it's working with the leadership to establish
the right culture, which if you think about it, culture is how do we do things around here?
(06:20):
It's not beer pong, it's not beanbags, it's not snacks- Yeah.
it's how do we do things around here?
And it's working hand-in-hand with leadership teams to create the most effective culture possible, so that you can use your resources the best way.
Because startups are always constrained with resources, and if you improve productivity by 5, 10%, then you've technically improved your runway by 5 or 10%.
(06:51):
Yes.
So that's a, that's a big difference.
Okay.
Thank you for that.
And I think you, you mentioned kind of jumping in and out from, fractional engagements to, like, maybe taking on a more permanent roles.
Can we kind of zoom in a bit about kind of that, that moment where you
Your first fractional gig, or kind of like that first, um, stretch of time where, you know, kind of went from having a full time job to considering fractional, going fractional, finding that, you know, first one to customers' projects?
(07:25):
How did that kind of go about?
And, and, you know, kind of walk us through that journey.
That was
So I had been made
It was just after COVID, so 2021?
20-
Uh, late '21, early '22.
And, uh, in '21, I was made redundant in February, and then made redundant in December.
(07:51):
Uh, and I was just kind of, "I don't want to do this anymore.
Uh, I'm going, I'm going fractional."
And I put it out to my network, and somebody who I worked with at Nimbula, actually, Phil, who is, has become a friend over the, the years, introduced me to a company called Chassis Autonomy.
(08:11):
And they had a base in Sweden, and they wanted to scale their operations in the UK, so they asked me to come in, have a look at their culture, how do we communicate between the 2 countries when you have a team that's mostly remote and a team that's mostly on site?
And, uh, so that was my very first client.
And it was, um, a little bit scary.
(08:35):
Well, quite a bit scary, because I- I left my job in early December, and then mid-January I- I started doing the posting on LinkedIn, and advertising myself, and the website, and all of that.
And there was nothing.
Crickets.
And it was- Sounds familiar, yes.
And I was going, "Well, I have a certain am- amount of savings, but I need, I still need to keep the money coming in."
(09:02):
Um, and then Phil introduced me to, to Tom, and I was kind of, "Yes!"
But that was just one day a week, so, so it was kind of, "Okay, this is good.
It's great."
But it's- Great start.
it's not covering everything.
And I kept on, uh, looking for, for people to work with.
And what I
(09:23):
So I did a lot
.9999999998836I do, I still do a lot of outreach on LinkedIn for, uh, founders, because it's founders I, uh, I work with.
And, uh, speaking with people who are in the same kind of fields that are interesting, and through that, I found my next 2 clients.
(09:45):
So the
.9999999998836Well, no.
Before that, I found another client, it was Phil's company who actually hired me to help them set up their culture, because they just got started.
So we did a, a w- a culture workshop to get their purpose, vision, mission, decision-making framework together, and then I helped implement it within the business.
(10:06):
And then the next 2 gigs were found through networking on LinkedIn.
So finding those people, having a phone conversation or an online conversation with them, and then after that, "Okay, I can recommend Stef for"
And most of my clients have come through referrals.
I do a lot of outreach.
I speak with a lot of founders.
(10:26):
but the most effective method for me has been referrals.
Interesting.
Um, I'm hearing that from, like, I think, literally every person that I had on the show so far- Yeah.
that the number one source is referral.
But I am hearing more and more, especially recently, Fractionals that are saying, "Yeah, we're, we're doubling down on outreach."
(10:46):
We're doing, um
I heard a few that are doing cold emails or cold calling, but I think most of them are just, like, referring- reverting to LinkedIn outreach.
Yeah.
And, and is that, uh
How's that working?
Um
Out of curiosity.
I've got a love-hate relationship with it.
(11:08):
I totally relate.
Right?
I love meeting with people.
I love hearing what all the new techs and one of the founders, like, one of the startups is going off, "Oh, this is amazing that someone thought about it."
Learning about new problems and how they're getting solved, this is amazing.
The sales bit is my big learning bear.
(11:30):
Um, learning every day.
Yeah.
I'm not great at it yet, but it is just learning every day.
I was- I'm lucky that a, a friend of mine is helping Fractional people set up, and he, he has a
I took part into his course, and he has a lot of system that he shares with you and helps you set up your brand and all of that.
(11:50):
So, that was a big help for me, and at the same time, sales is still my bugbear.
And as soon as I can, I will be outsourcing it because
Yes, n- not fun, but a, a necessary evil- Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
.00000000011642I think. 156 00:12:09,180.00000000011642 --> 00:12:11,100 Um, all right.
(12:11):
Y- you mentioned the, um, uh, culture workshop and, and that's, you know
I think that's interesting.
I, I
One of my last gigs as a full-time CMO, I was a part of such a workshop.
Um, I was actually part of, of, of the team that kind of built and led that workshop together with our head of HR and then another person from the team.
(12:32):
So, it was like
It was a funny mix.
It was like chief of marketing, VP of design, and head of HR that are doing a culture workshop together.
Oh, that
Um, we were the ones who, like, cared about it the most- Yeah.
.00000000011642and wanted to push it. 168 00:12:47,180.00000000011642 --> 00:12:55,620 Um, I'm wondering from, from your perspective, like, how, how do you kind of go about and set that up when, when you need
(12:55):
.00000000011642you have a customer that says, "This is what I want."? 170 00:12:58,180.00000000011642 --> 00:12:58,690 Yeah.
"I need, I need to, to kind of double down on my culture."
Maybe even
L- let me rephrase the question.
So, maybe even taking it a step back before we talk about the actual kind of, like, workshop, which I, I would love to hear about.
How, how does, how does that engagement kind of looks like?
Like, does the founder come to you and say, "Stef, I need better culture," or, like, what's, what's typically the ask that they come in through the door with?
(13:23):
The, the ask is usually, "My team is not working as well as it can."
Okay, interesting.
And when I ask more questions, what I find out is that they have people in roles, but because they're still fairly, fairly small, the roles are not well-defined.
They know where they want to go, they know what their, their goal is, but they're not well-organized.
(13:46):
And the culture workshop helps them think about their business in a slightly different way.
And it's as I said early on is, how do we work together?
So, when you have, like, the, the founding team, like 3, 4 people, you can do marketing, I can do people.
.9999999998836We have somebody who's going to do sales, and somebody who's going to do product in-depth. 185 00:14:06,319.9999999998836 --> 00:14:07,640 Usually, that's
(14:07):
.00000000011642Yeah. 187 00:14:08,180.00000000011642 --> 00:14:11,408 And even people comes a little bit later most of the time.
I do my thing, we meet, we talk about it, and I go back, do my thing.
But when you start scaling, when you start hiring more people, that very close-knit team where people know what they should be doing is not there anymore.
There's, there's more things that we need to work out for people to work together effectively.
(14:32):
And so, what I ask them is, "Okay, how do you work together now?
What's working?
What's not working?
And how do you make decisions?
.9999999998836Who is responsible for what?" 196 00:14:41,579.9999999998836 --> 00:14:45,800 And what I usually find out is kind of, "Oh, well, I'm responsible for this, this, and this."
And then this person say, "Oh, no, I'm responsible for that."
And there's a- Yes, sounds familiar.
(14:52):
.9999999998836Yeah, there's a, there's a lot of confusion. 200 00:14:54,579.9999999998836 --> 00:14:59,760 So, the, the culture workshop is to help them create that framework.
And I use Simon Sinek's system of Find Your Why.
And you, so basically, you start with finding your purpose and then your vision.
.0000000001164So, purpose is why are we here, and it's usually a goal that no one is ever going to achieve. 204 00:15:15,920.0000000001164 --> 00:15:18,579.9999999998836 But it's the greatest- great vision, it's amazing. 205 00:15:18,579.9999999998836 --> 00:15:22,832 The vision is, well, bring it back down a little bit.
(15:23):
What is it that we are doing? 207 00:15:26,79.99999999988358 --> 00:15:29,420.0000000001164 And then the mission is, how are we doing it right now? 208 00:15:29,420.0000000001164 --> 00:15:34,032 Over the next 2, 3 years, how are we going to achieve the vision so that we can achieve the purpose?
.9999999998836And once you have all of that with all of the material that you get from those 3 things, you can decide on what are the values of the business, because they usually fall from, uh, the, the values. 210 00:15:49,839.9999999998836 --> 00:15:54,832 And once you have the values, then you can answer the question, how do we make decisions?
(15:56):
And with the decision-making framework, then you can say, "Okay, so you're responsible for marketing.
Those are the 4, 5 areas that where you're going to focus on, and this is how you make decisions, and you have"
some startups put a budget value saying you can make, you can spend up to 10,000 without asking for anything.
(16:19):
.0000000001164If there is anything that concerns another department, you have to make the decision with them. 215 00:16:24,910.0000000001164 --> 00:16:29,540 If there's anything that goes over that budget, you have to make the decision with the rest of the team.
.0000000001164And that provides people with what I like to call it a playpen. 217 00:16:34,410.0000000001164 --> 00:16:37,730 It just says, "This, this is my, my little box."
Yeah.
.0000000001164"I can play and do whatever I want in there, and if I want to play outside of that, I need to go work for some- somebody else." 220 00:16:47,829.9999999998836 --> 00:17:01,310 And from there, you can then build everything within the, within the business, because everyone knows how to make decision, everyone knows what the values are, and I think Niium is probably the best company I've seen using their values.
(17:01):
.0000000001164So, we, we did that value workshop and they, uh, they were looking for investment. 222 00:17:08,410.0000000001164 --> 00:17:25,552.0000000001164 So, Niium does green ammonia, and BP wanted to invest in them, they wanted to buy the technology, but BP's values don't align with Niium's values, and they refused a very, very large investment because they were not aligned. 223 00:17:27,150.00000000011642 --> 00:17:27,869.9999999998836 Interesting. 224 00:17:27,869.9999999998836 --> 00:17:32,170 That's how, that's how, that's how impactful it can be.
(17:32):
And now they, they are growing, they're scaling.
.00000000023283They've just released their first, um, reactor, so like a proper full-scale reactor, shipped it to Australia, and i- it is just a- amazing how having that value focus helps you do a lot more with a lot less.
(17:55):
I remember when, when we were doing this workshop that one of, one of the things that kind of guided us was
Uh, I don't remember who said that principle, but it was very similar to what you said.
It was values, like how do you know that you've picked the right mission statement and the right value, uh, the right values?
Be painful.
If your values are, are kind of, like, bland and it's like, you know
(18:21):
Integrity, trust.
Yeah, but like, if you don't pick a value that's like
It's a hill that you will die on, so to speak.
Exactly, yeah.
It's like, at some point during my company's life, I will come across a decision where money might lead me to one place, but my values will lead me to another place, and it will be a painful decision.
(18:44):
But that's the value that I want, or at least that's the value that as a founder, let's move to third person, that's the value that as a, as a founder, you should pick.
The one that's painful because that's the one that defines your company's DNA and your company's culture.
Absolutely.
.99999999976717And have you had 241 00:19:05,409.99999999976717 --> 00:19:07,830 So, let's kind of continue and build on that.
(19:07):
Have you had in- instances where you kind of did this process and then you realized, "Yeah, they're not gonna do it."
Like, "These are not"
You know, they, they
Okay, they, they, you know, they speak the speak, but they don't walk the walk.
Like, "I don't see how this founder, the CEO, or someone else, like, from, from, like, upper management is actually, like, going to live up to those values."
(19:33):
Quite a few times.
Yes, I was afraid you're gonna say that.
But that's, that's what you're saying, right?
.9999999997672The, the challenge is when you found the business, when you're, when you're a founder, you're there, you want to solve a problem, and at the same time, it's a business, you, you need to make money, and, uh, there's always the fear that you're going to fail, and you don't want to fail. 251 00:20:01,659.9999999997672 --> 00:20:02,670 Like, that's go
(20:02):
The, the greatest, greatest pain you could feel is the failure of, of that business, because you attach
.9999999997672It's your baby, you're attached to it. 254 00:20:10,889.9999999997672 --> 00:20:25,940 And when you have 2 months' runway and you have a, a big investor that comes in and say, "Well, I give you the 3 million that you need to, to scale, but you have to do things our way," it's a very difficult decision.
(20:25):
It's either, you're going to feel like a failure because you, you didn't take that investment, and, and you have also the attachment to do the team and the people who invested in you early stage, and it's kind of, you don't want to fail them.
You don't want to feel like a failure, and you don't want to f- fail the people who are working with you.
So, it's, it's a very difficult decision.
(20:47):
That's one thing that sometimes makes people say, "Well, okay, we'll take that investment and we'll work it out."
Right?
We, as human, we have an optimism bias, and think that, "Well, I can smoke 10 a day and doesn't do anything to me," right?
"I'll, I'll, I'll be safe.
It doesn't"
It's, it's the same kind of, same kind of thinking.
(21:09):
And there is, the other thing is, what most founders find very difficult, and I think it's more most leader fi- find really difficult, is the fact that behave, uh, like, aligning your behavior to your values sometimes goes, uh, your business values sometimes go against your personal values.
(21:32):
And that means doing some self-reflection work, means, uh, changing your behavior, and that's very, very difficult.
Like, no one changes unless they see the need to change themselves.
So, as a, as a coach, I could tell you, "Well, this is what I see, and you can change this way, this way, or this way."
(21:53):
If you don't see the value in changing, you're never gonna, going to change.
And that's usually the most difficult thing for founders, is having to self-reflect, realize the tension between the business need and the, the personal, like, personal challenge, do that self-reflection, and then say, "I need to change my behavior so that my business will benefit."
(22:19):
Yeah.
Um, I feel your categories with us.
Um, and have you, no, have you gotten into instances where, you know, you were approached by a potential customer, and then you kind of started the exploration and you're like, "Okay, no, this is not a founder I can work with"?
(22:41):
Um, I- Like pushing back on, on a project because you felt, you know, like, it doesn't, it won't work?
I haven't, and at the same time, I hope I have learned and will do it in the future.
Because there has been a couple of engagements that didn't finish as I would have hoped, and where the implementing those changes were very, very difficult, and the changes didn't happen, so I failed in what I said I was going to, to accomplish, and they felt that they had failed as well.
(23:16):
But there's been a, a
And it was m- early on in, uh, when I was more, uh, freelancing rather than, uh, than fractional.
There's been one engagement that I re- remember particularly, where I managed to get the team together.
.99999999976717So, I was still in CX. 280 00:23:36,139.99999999976717 --> 00:23:47,400 I managed to get the team together, and then when I asked, I spoke with the leaders around the business and say, "This behavior across the business needs to change if you want CX to be successful."
(23:47):
And that didn't, didn't happen.
So we ended up, we ended the relationship, and what happened is then that 3 weeks after I had left, 60% of the CX team had left.
Wow.
That's a lot.
It's a, it's a big
Uh, and, uh, I'd spent 9 months recruiting for that team.
(24:09):
Did the founder reach back to you after, after that?
No.
.00000000023283They were too, too prideful, I guess, to-
Yeah.
Yeah, that sounds hard.
But it was interesting, um, side, sidetracking.
You said, uh, "That was earlier when I was freelancing, and not fractional."
(24:30):
And I, I wanna, uh, go back to that, because I think some of the listeners, or watchers, will, will ponder on the difference.
So, how do you define the difference?
So, freelance, I was full-time with a business for 6 months, and it was usually 6 months rolling contracts.
So, it's full-time with one business.
(24:52):
As a fractional, I currently have 3 clients.
Okay.
And I, I am one day a week with each client.
Well, one day a week with 2 clients, and there's one w- that's more ad hoc work.
When they, when they need me, I'm here and I do, I do the work for, for them.
So, freelance is more jumping from project to project, and fractional is very much- By doing one at a time?
(25:17):
Yeah.
And fractional is embedding, I am part of the team.
I am their head of people, chief, chief, chief people 0 officer, people expert, whatever title they want to give me.
I, I don't mind very much.
.9999999997672But I am their, I am their people person, and I will help them develop their business and their culture in a way that will help them grow and scale.
(25:40):
Got it.
Okay, thank you for that clarification.
Um, have you, um, have you ever had someone reach out with, like, uh, an emergency, everything's-on-fire situation, where they're like, "Stef, I need you yesterday.
The building's on fire."
Everyone's with the puking emoji.
"Come and fix this."
(26:00):
Yeah, I've, I've had that, uh, a couple of times.
A couple of times?
Okay.
Um
And it's-Usually on specific issues.
And that's why I started doing the power hours, where I jump on a call with the founder or whatever th- who, the lea- leader was experiencing the, the problem and we solve the problem together.
(26:20):
.9999999997672Uh, one of them was a team member who was regularly sick and, and not pulling their weight when they were, when they were there. 322 00:26:31,514.9999999997672 --> 00:26:42,056 So what we, we did is, uh, go back and work out what's the sick leave policy?
(26:42):
What do we do?
How do we support the team members?
.9999999997672Because the business really wanted to support the team members in being, uh, like healthy, sorting their 326 00:26:51,985.9999999997672 --> 00:26:56,400 Have the time to sort their health issues and then be able to contribute to the team.
And, uh, so that really helped the business establish that, that structure.
And the team member decided that they want
(27:04):
They were going to leave because of this.
When they
.99999999976717there was a little bit of scrutiny into what they were doing, they didn't feel comfortable with that, so they decided to leave. 332 00:27:15,14.99999999976717 --> 00:27:21,116 And the other one was a, a client I speak with on and off quite regularly.
And it was like 9:00 at night and I got a
(27:25):
get a call and say, "Look, we've got this-" That's never a good sign.
They don't usually call.
Like, we're not
That is a phone call.
.99999999976717Yeah. 339 00:27:33,255.99999999976717 --> 00:27:35,775 That's like really, everything's on fire.
And they had hired someone who was supposed to start the next day.
And realized that actually what they wanted to do with the role, h- that person wasn't the right person and the role needed to change quite tremendously.
(27:52):
That's
That's
Okay.
.0000000002328That's hard. 346 00:27:55,956.0000000002328 --> 00:27:56,106 So, because
So things that happened in the business, they wanted to pivot a little bit and they realized that role then wasn't relevant anymore and the person couldn't fit in the new role, the new direction they were, they were going into.
And what we worked out is, um, to call the candidate very early in the morning and offer them a severance package, even though they hadn't started to say, "Look, we're very sorry.
(28:27):
We- we've messed up.
But here is 3 months worth of money and a reference, so that you can find something else."
That's generous.
It wa- it was very generous and e- I
That's the kind of clients I want to work with, right?
"We, we made a mistake, we're going to fix it."
.999999999767169And it's to the benefit of the business because it helped their reputation. 356 00:28:51,5.999999999767169 --> 00:28:52,976 So they worked in a- Yeah.
(28:52):
.9999999997672in a small city in Denmark and they are one of the main employers.
So there are, there are a lot of people who knows about them and they know that the word is going to go around.
So that- Yeah.
benefits their reputation and at the same time, the person wasn't left in the lurch, lurch without any money.
.99999999976717Exactly.
.9999999997672I know a lot of businesses that would just say, "Sorry."
(29:16):
"Bye."
"Good luck."
And I've, I've heard- "Maybe you quit your job for us.
.00000000023283Maybe you turned down 3 other offers last week."
"Sorry.
Good luck."
Yeah.
Yeah.
"We're a business.
Our bottom line matters more than you."
Yeah.
Yeah.
I guess those are not the types of founders that you want.
All right.
(29:36):
Well, that kinda leads me to, to our next segment.
Though I think we touched on that a bit, but, uh, um, let's see if maybe we can find another one of your fracked up
one of your most fracked up moments.
So something that maybe, you know, you mentioned that w- with all the s- like a ton of the CX team leaving earlier in your career.
(29:59):
But maybe something a bit more recent that comes to mind of a fracked up moment.
Something that didn't really work out as planned.
.99999999976717A CEO sending me a list of people in WhatsApp.
And I, I was kind of, "I don't want anything to do with that.
I want you to fire them."
And it's kind of, "Well, why?
(30:21):
Why do you want me to fire them?"
"Uh, they're not doing the
They're"
Okay.
So some of those people are very junior, and I'm pretty sure he never spoke with them.
"How do you know they're not doing their job?"
"I spoke with people in the team, and they said that they didn't like that person."
And I was just kind of.
(30:41):
Breathe in, breathe out.
So I said, "Just leave it with me, and I will investigate with those people's manager, and I will un- understand what's going on, and we will do what's, uh, what's needed."
So I, I went to all of the managers.
I looked at the person's performance, how their goals were set, the feedback they got, and the majority of the, the staff were fairly new, hadn't had any training, and were fairly junior in their career as well.
(31:12):
And so the team that had been there for a long time knew what to do, and they were just kind of, "Well, do this thing."
It's kind of, "Well, I don't know how to do this thing.
Can you teach me?"
A- and that hadn't happened.
Uh, so I helped the manager put a, like, goals in place and a plan, uh, and, uh, 3 quarters improved their performance because they received the training, and then about a quarter had to leave because they were not performing.
(31:41):
Uh, but that, um, managing by hearsay, uh, I, I was
The mind-blown emoji is a good one.
Exactly.
We'll call this the emoji episode, but yes.
Wow.
So 3 quarters ended up staying.
Yep.
Amazing.
(32:03):
Okay.
That is a fracked-up moment.
Thank you-
for that.
Uh, that's one, that one's gonna keep me up at night.
So let's, um, let's switch gears and go into our quickfire round.
So I'll ask you a few questions and just happy to hear your, your thoughts.
Um, and I'll, I'll, I'll start with a bit of a controversy.
(32:24):
So frack or fiction?
Fractional HR is just a fancy name for a recruiter.
Fiction. 423 00:32:34,860.0000000002328 --> 00:32:36,960 Do you want to add a sentence to that?
Um, so a fractional HR can do recruitment.
They will add a lot more value if they don't only do recruitment.
(32:47):
And you'd probably get a lot more value out of an agency, a recruitment agency or an embedded recruiter, because I can do recruitment, but it's not my main skill.
So, so it's a thing that I have done, and I happily do it quite regularly.
And at the same time, I'm better at building teams.
So I'm good at, at choosing the people, but the, all the, the admin that goes behind the, the recruitment, you need a specialist to be able to do that most effectively and actually source the, the right candidates and, and things like that.
(33:24):
Okay.
That's a very solid answer.
What is the one tool in your toolbox that you swear by?
ChatGPT.
Oh, it's I use it for that now.
Um, the reason I'm saying this is, so Asana records all of my meetings.
(33:47):
It helps me keep track of all the things I have to do.
It helps me improve as well because I can get it to look across all of my meeting and saying, "What are the trends?
How can I improve?"
So I use it as a, as a coach as well.
.9999999997672And whenever I'm working on the project, if I don't have a, a team wi- with me, I use it to brainstorm initially, and then I have a better idea of where we can go before I take that to the teams I work with. 441 00:34:20,739.9999999997672 --> 00:34:28,139.99999999976717 So it's initial brainstorm, I get an idea of what we, we should be doing, then I take it to the team and say, "I'm thinking about that. 442 00:34:28,139.99999999976717 --> 00:34:30,384 How does that work for, for the team?"
(34:31):
And research as well. 444 00:34:33,320.00000000023283 --> 00:34:38,520 So when, when I need to understand, so we're having that problem, where does that come from?
Is there psychology attached to it?
Is there research atta- uh, attached to it?
So it helps me understand problems better.
.00000000023283And so that I don't have to be on Google for days before I get the information I need. 449 00:34:52,300.00000000023283 --> 00:34:54,096 It just does all that in seconds.
(34:55):
Okay.
What's your definition of a dream client versus a nightmare client?
We kind of touched on that earlier, but let's, let's recap that into a-
something.
Um, a dream client is a client who understand that putting their people first is going to benefit their business in the long run.
(35:22):
Uh, it's like, to me, it's like building a house.
You wouldn't build a house if you didn't have the foundations.
The foundations is the frameworks that you need for your people to work together and then prioritizing your people in every decision you're making.
And once you have that in place, your people are going to do the job, and they will be doing the job more, much more effectively than if you just put a jumble of people together and, and tell them, "Collaborate."
(35:48):
collaborate is a big word.
It's, what does that mean?
Yeah.
How do we work?
Um, and a nightmare client is somebody who sends me a list of people and tells me, "You need to fire them."
Send you a list of people on WhatsApp with, with a fire emoji.Okay.
Where do you see, and that's a big one, I know, but where do you see the future of Fractional?
(36:13):
I see that as the key to success for small businesses.
And not, not only start-ups, it's all small businesses because there are a lot of, of businesses that have, like, 30, 40 people who have a random operations person handle pretty much everything.
(36:36):
And it might be fun and exciting if they are a generalist, and sometimes they will need the knowledge of a specialist.
S- so if I, if I take an office manager, for instance, they're going to organize the events, they're going to do DHL, they're going to do the managing the office, they're going to help people sort things out, do the contracts and all of that.
(37:01):
Having a Fractional person helps take all of the, the admin and organizing things away so that the operations person can actually make sure that everything is working together the way it should.
And, uh, it can give a small business access to marketing or to, uh, more sales, or to a proper finance person rather than trying to do your, your accounts at the end of the year and not being sure.
(37:29):
Like, my, my accountant, uh, fired a client recently because the client came to them with 2 bag full of receipts-
and told them- That feels very outdated.
If they'd had a Fractional person doing their bookkeeping, like, one day a month, their, their accounting bill at the end of the year would have been a lot less expensive- Exactly.
(37:55):
and they would be saving a lot more money because they're managing their accounts better.
Okay.
That's an interesting, uh, perspective, and one that I don't hear often, 'cause I think a lot of, of the Fractionals that I, that I've been talking to are very, very focused on tech, start-ups, so that's kind of, like, a bit of a left field perspective and I like that.
(38:17):
Okay, so we're kinda gearing up to, um, towards the, the wrap up of, of this episode, but I do have one final question, uh, and that's one that I really, really like.
One of, one of the, the personas that I hope is listening to, to these episodes, to this podcast, is people who are maybe still a bit earlier in their career path, maybe still full time and, and kinda thinking about going Fractional or aspiring to be, like, a Fractional leader.
(38:51):
Uh, if you could give one piece of advice to someone like that, what would that be?
Start building your brand before you go Fractional, because you need that, what's the word?
Social proof.
And so we, what we said is most of the Fractional contract we get is referrals. 484 00:39:11,663.9999999995343 --> 00:39:22,484 But when a friend of mine is te- telling John that, uh, they should contact Steph, what John is going to do is go on social, find Steph, see what she's saying- Exactly.
(39:22):
before they're talking to her.
So you need to have that social proof so that people can relate to you and is kind of, "Well, okay, so Steph has done a podcast.
.9999999995343She is, she doesn't want to work with people who send a, a list of, of people to fire. 488 00:39:38,663.9999999995343 --> 00:39:40,624 That's not my kind of Fractional person."
.00000000046566Uh, you can- Yeah. 490 00:39:42,104.00000000046566 --> 00:39:50,444 you can make those, so you filter people and you also build your social proof and your expertise out there.
(39:50):
The other one would be network freely.
So find who you want to target and network with those people with no expectations. 493 00:40:00,163.99999999953434 --> 00:40:06,424 I'm do- I'm doing that a lot and I get to, a lot of very early stage founders saying, "Can we jump on a call?
I have an idea.
I need to brainstorm."
And I, I do that with quite a lot of people because I'm interested in, on what people, people are thinking about- Yeah.
(40:16):
and it's building my network.
And through that, I've had some referrals, intro- introductions as well.
So you're, you're building your network that way, by helping without expecting anything, and at the same time, you're, you're learning.
So that would be the, the 2 things.
And when you launch, like, in the market currently, you have 6 months to a year runway.
(40:38):
If you're launching without any client lined up already, have 6 months to a year runway, because there's going to be a lot of grind before you find clients.
That's a golden tip, and I think a really, really important one as well.
Yeah.
Especially if you want to kind of have a more structured and maybe saner first few months- Yeah.
(41:04):
to a year of, of a Fractional journey, because it does tend to be a bit of a roller coaster, um, when you start out, at least in terms of, like, balancing client work and, and outreach and finding those initial opportunities.
Yeah, yeah.
And it also reminded, uh, so what I learned as a freelancer, it's a little bit feast and famine.
So the way I do it now is I have 3 to 4 days of client work, and then one day where I'm going to do all of my outreach and all of my connecting and meeting with other people, so that instead of having up and down, I still have up and downs, but they're not, they're not as big.
(41:43):
Kind of flattening the graph in a good way.
Okay.
Those are fantastic tips.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay.
So that brings us to the end of the episode, uh, but before we wrap up, Steph, uh, if anyone wants to reach out, so obviously, um, I'll make sure your, your LinkedIn, um, is in the show notes, so anyone who wants to reach out, um, will and, and can find you.
(42:08):
Um, is there any specific
So again, we talked about, if you're a founder that plans on dropping a list of people you want to fire on WhatsApp at 9:00 PM, then Steph is probably not the person to reach out to.
Uh, but is there a specific kind of, of, of profile that, that
if, if, if you're a founder listening and you have this challenge, Steph is, is the person to reach out to?
(42:33):
Uh, yeah, so, uh, it's startups that it's post-seed gearing to Series A usually, so when you're starting scaling, because what happens is when you're starting scaling, you're bringing a lot more people in, and that starts changing the culture of the business.
So if you want to maintain effectiveness and the culture of your business at the same time, is just before you start hiring, I'm a good person to, to call.
(43:02):
Okay.
I can say that, uh, I've, I've been in a lot of, uh, in a lot of those stages in, in, in different companies, and that's definitely a stage where I wish I had-
someone like you to talk to.
It's when things just go past.
Um, would, would have saved me a lot of, a lot of, uh, a lot of growing pains, yes.
(43:24):
Thank you.
Okay.
So that wraps up our episode for today, so, um, if you're listening, if you're watching us on YouTube, um, thank you first of all, and I hope you enjoyed this episode.
Uh, if you enjoyed our conversation today, please like, follow, subscribe, leave a review, leave a comment, share the episode with a founder or, or a fellow Fractional, um, and Steph, thank you so much.
(43:51):
Uh- Uh, it's been a pleasure, and thank you for, for everyone listening.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Same here.
Thank you.
Bye.
What most founders find very difficult, and I think it's more most leader find really difficult, is the fact that aligning your behavior to your business values sometimes go against your personal values.
And when you have 2 months' runway and you have a, a big investor that comes and say, "Well, I give you the 3 million that you need to, to scale, but you have to do things our way," it's a very difficult decision.
(00:29):
If you think about it, culture is how do we do things around here?
It's not beer pong, it's not beanbags, it's not snacks.
It's how do we do things around here?
And it's working hand-in-hand with leadership teams to create the most effective culture possible so that you can use your resources the best way.
(00:50):
The startups are always constrained with resources, and if you improve productivity by 5 to 10%, then you've technically improved your runway by 5 to 10%.
So that's a, that's a big difference.
Steph is a fractional head of people, and a product-minded chief people officer who scales startups without the drama.
(01:10):
Steph turns HR into a growth engine, skills-first hiring, stronger managers, and a clean people stack that actually ships results.
From early-stage chaos to hypergrowth, Steph's the steady hand that's installing systems and rhythms that stick.
Welcome to Oh, Frack!, the podcast where top fractional leaders share their wins, struggles, and stories from the trenches, hosted by Adir Ron.
(01:36):
Welcome to Oh, Frack!, the podcast where we dive into the world of fractional leadership, the wins, the struggles, and everything in between.
I'm your host, Adir Ron, Fractional CMO.
And my guest today is Steph Thommen.
Hi, Steph.
.9999999999854Hi, Ron.
Thank you for joining me today.
A pleasure.
(01:58):
Pleasure's all mine.
.000000000014552So Steph is a fractional head of people, and a product-minded chief people officer who scales startups without the drama. 22 00:02:09,20.000000000014552 --> 00:02:17,648.0000000000291 Steph turns HR into a growth engine, skills-first hiring, stronger managers, and a clean people stack that actually ships results.
.0000000000291From early-stage chaos to hypergrowth, Steph's the steady hand that's installing systems and rhythms that stick.
(02:26):
Thank you.
.0000000000291So welcome, and thank you for joining me today.
And, uh, let's, uh, let's kick it off with a fun little icebreaker question.
Okay.
.0000000000291So
And, and I, I've been thinking, I always take some time to think of, like, a fun little interaction to, to kick off an episode.
And, uh, I've, uh, I've seen this interesting, uh, discussion a few days ago on, like, emojis that encompass an entire situation, an- an- an entire unraveling catastrophes in one emoji.
(02:59):
So can you think of a broken culture that you've experienced, um, and describe it with an emoji?
And which emoji would that be?
Ooh.
That's a hard one.
That's, I apologize.
I don't know.
(03:20):
Um
The one emoji would be the sick emoji, you know, the green one with the want to vomit.
.0000000000291That's what, that's what broken culture make me feel like.
Okay.
And it's how, if you speak with the staff who work within a broken culture, it's often how they feel.
(03:43):
They feel sick because they can't win.
There's no- nothing they can do to win.
Interesting.
I would imagine actually the, the dead one with the Xs for eyes, or the dazed one with, like, the, the spiraling, uh, spirals for eyes.
The one with the swear words as well.
That, that's a good one.
That's a great one, yeah.
.0000000000291I've had that at a couple of places, unfortunately, so, so yes.
(04:07):
All right.
So we, we, we figured out our emojis.
That's a great start.
So Steph, tell us a bit about your journey into fractional head of people. 54 00:04:18,420.0000000000291 --> 00:04:21,072 How, or you know, how, how the frack did you get here?
How the frack did I get here?
It, it's been a long and interesting journey.
So I started in, in customer service, in customer success, and I ended up leading teams in large call centers.
(04:33):
And what I found within those call centers is the fact that the more rigid the structure, the less initiative you see in the team members.
And that slows everything down.
Because there's no real initiative, the team members expect the management to solve everything, where they could be solving things with the customers themselves.
(04:56):
And that started a journey for me in understanding what makes people tick and how do you build a good team culture?
And I've been going between being freelancer fractional to, uh, being permanent with big businesses and startups.
(05:16):
And when I join a startup, I get an interesting project, and sometimes they ask me to stay, and if I really like the, the project, I stay, and then I go back to fractional after a while, after a while.
But the- So it's kind of like in and out.
It's in, in and out.
And I think, I think I've reached the point where I much prefer being fractional.
Okay, that's good.
Then you're at the right podcast.
(05:37):
So now, now I know exactly what I wanna do.
But it took, it took a while.
My journey from CX to people has been, well, if I can create great teams or, like
What I'm really strong at is creating great teams.
.0000000000582And if I can create great teams in CX or in operations, I can do that for the whole business and have a great impact.
(05:58):
So I worked for a startup called Nimbler.
Sadly, they, they closed now, but I started in CX, set up all of their CX and then moved into, into people as we scale, and I've stayed in, in people.
But then
And it's working with the leadership to establish
the right culture, which if you think about it, culture is how do we do things around here?
(06:20):
It's not beer pong, it's not beanbags, it's not snacks- Yeah.
it's how do we do things around here?
And it's working hand-in-hand with leadership teams to create the most effective culture possible, so that you can use your resources the best way.
Because startups are always constrained with resources, and if you improve productivity by 5, 10%, then you've technically improved your runway by 5 or 10%.
(06:51):
Yes.
So that's a, that's a big difference.
Okay.
Thank you for that.
And I think you, you mentioned kind of jumping in and out from, fractional engagements to, like, maybe taking on a more permanent roles.
Can we kind of zoom in a bit about kind of that, that moment where you
Your first fractional gig, or kind of like that first, um, stretch of time where, you know, kind of went from having a full time job to considering fractional, going fractional, finding that, you know, first one to customers' projects?
(07:25):
How did that kind of go about?
And, and, you know, kind of walk us through that journey.
That was
So I had been made
It was just after COVID, so 2021?
20-
Uh, late '21, early '22.
And, uh, in '21, I was made redundant in February, and then made redundant in December.
(07:51):
Uh, and I was just kind of, "I don't want to do this anymore.
Uh, I'm going, I'm going fractional."
And I put it out to my network, and somebody who I worked with at Nimbula, actually, Phil, who is, has become a friend over the, the years, introduced me to a company called Chassis Autonomy.
(08:11):
And they had a base in Sweden, and they wanted to scale their operations in the UK, so they asked me to come in, have a look at their culture, how do we communicate between the 2 countries when you have a team that's mostly remote and a team that's mostly on site?
And, uh, so that was my very first client.
And it was, um, a little bit scary.
(08:35):
Well, quite a bit scary, because I- I left my job in early December, and then mid-January I- I started doing the posting on LinkedIn, and advertising myself, and the website, and all of that.
And there was nothing.
Crickets.
And it was- Sounds familiar, yes.
And I was going, "Well, I have a certain am- amount of savings, but I need, I still need to keep the money coming in."
(09:02):
Um, and then Phil introduced me to, to Tom, and I was kind of, "Yes!"
But that was just one day a week, so, so it was kind of, "Okay, this is good.
It's great."
But it's- Great start.
it's not covering everything.
And I kept on, uh, looking for, for people to work with.
And what I
(09:23):
So I did a lot
.9999999998836I do, I still do a lot of outreach on LinkedIn for, uh, founders, because it's founders I, uh, I work with.
And, uh, speaking with people who are in the same kind of fields that are interesting, and through that, I found my next 2 clients.
(09:45):
So the
.9999999998836Well, no.
Before that, I found another client, it was Phil's company who actually hired me to help them set up their culture, because they just got started.
So we did a, a w- a culture workshop to get their purpose, vision, mission, decision-making framework together, and then I helped implement it within the business.
(10:06):
And then the next 2 gigs were found through networking on LinkedIn.
So finding those people, having a phone conversation or an online conversation with them, and then after that, "Okay, I can recommend Stef for"
And most of my clients have come through referrals.
I do a lot of outreach.
I speak with a lot of founders.
(10:26):
but the most effective method for me has been referrals.
Interesting.
Um, I'm hearing that from, like, I think, literally every person that I had on the show so far- Yeah.
that the number one source is referral.
But I am hearing more and more, especially recently, Fractionals that are saying, "Yeah, we're, we're doubling down on outreach."
(10:46):
We're doing, um
I heard a few that are doing cold emails or cold calling, but I think most of them are just, like, referring- reverting to LinkedIn outreach.
Yeah.
And, and is that, uh
How's that working?
Um
Out of curiosity.
I've got a love-hate relationship with it.
(11:08):
I totally relate.
Right?
I love meeting with people.
I love hearing what all the new techs and one of the founders, like, one of the startups is going off, "Oh, this is amazing that someone thought about it."
Learning about new problems and how they're getting solved, this is amazing.
The sales bit is my big learning bear.
(11:30):
Um, learning every day.
Yeah.
I'm not great at it yet, but it is just learning every day.
I was- I'm lucky that a, a friend of mine is helping Fractional people set up, and he, he has a
I took part into his course, and he has a lot of system that he shares with you and helps you set up your brand and all of that.
(11:50):
So, that was a big help for me, and at the same time, sales is still my bugbear.
And as soon as I can, I will be outsourcing it because
Yes, n- not fun, but a, a necessary evil- Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
.00000000011642I think. 156 00:12:09,180.00000000011642 --> 00:12:11,100 Um, all right.
(12:11):
Y- you mentioned the, um, uh, culture workshop and, and that's, you know
I think that's interesting.
I, I
One of my last gigs as a full-time CMO, I was a part of such a workshop.
Um, I was actually part of, of, of the team that kind of built and led that workshop together with our head of HR and then another person from the team.
(12:32):
So, it was like
It was a funny mix.
It was like chief of marketing, VP of design, and head of HR that are doing a culture workshop together.
Oh, that
Um, we were the ones who, like, cared about it the most- Yeah.
.00000000011642and wanted to push it. 168 00:12:47,180.00000000011642 --> 00:12:55,620 Um, I'm wondering from, from your perspective, like, how, how do you kind of go about and set that up when, when you need
(12:55):
.00000000011642you have a customer that says, "This is what I want."? 170 00:12:58,180.00000000011642 --> 00:12:58,690 Yeah.
"I need, I need to, to kind of double down on my culture."
Maybe even
L- let me rephrase the question.
So, maybe even taking it a step back before we talk about the actual kind of, like, workshop, which I, I would love to hear about.
How, how does, how does that engagement kind of looks like?
Like, does the founder come to you and say, "Stef, I need better culture," or, like, what's, what's typically the ask that they come in through the door with?
(13:23):
The, the ask is usually, "My team is not working as well as it can."
Okay, interesting.
And when I ask more questions, what I find out is that they have people in roles, but because they're still fairly, fairly small, the roles are not well-defined.
They know where they want to go, they know what their, their goal is, but they're not well-organized.
(13:46):
And the culture workshop helps them think about their business in a slightly different way.
And it's as I said early on is, how do we work together?
So, when you have, like, the, the founding team, like 3, 4 people, you can do marketing, I can do people.
.9999999998836We have somebody who's going to do sales, and somebody who's going to do product in-depth. 185 00:14:06,319.9999999998836 --> 00:14:07,640 Usually, that's
(14:07):
.00000000011642Yeah. 187 00:14:08,180.00000000011642 --> 00:14:11,408 And even people comes a little bit later most of the time.
I do my thing, we meet, we talk about it, and I go back, do my thing.
But when you start scaling, when you start hiring more people, that very close-knit team where people know what they should be doing is not there anymore.
There's, there's more things that we need to work out for people to work together effectively.
(14:32):
And so, what I ask them is, "Okay, how do you work together now?
What's working?
What's not working?
And how do you make decisions?
.9999999998836Who is responsible for what?" 196 00:14:41,579.9999999998836 --> 00:14:45,800 And what I usually find out is kind of, "Oh, well, I'm responsible for this, this, and this."
And then this person say, "Oh, no, I'm responsible for that."
And there's a- Yes, sounds familiar.
(14:52):
.9999999998836Yeah, there's a, there's a lot of confusion. 200 00:14:54,579.9999999998836 --> 00:14:59,760 So, the, the culture workshop is to help them create that framework.
And I use Simon Sinek's system of Find Your Why.
And you, so basically, you start with finding your purpose and then your vision.
.0000000001164So, purpose is why are we here, and it's usually a goal that no one is ever going to achieve. 204 00:15:15,920.0000000001164 --> 00:15:18,579.9999999998836 But it's the greatest- great vision, it's amazing. 205 00:15:18,579.9999999998836 --> 00:15:22,832 The vision is, well, bring it back down a little bit.
(15:23):
What is it that we are doing? 207 00:15:26,79.99999999988358 --> 00:15:29,420.0000000001164 And then the mission is, how are we doing it right now? 208 00:15:29,420.0000000001164 --> 00:15:34,032 Over the next 2, 3 years, how are we going to achieve the vision so that we can achieve the purpose?
.9999999998836And once you have all of that with all of the material that you get from those 3 things, you can decide on what are the values of the business, because they usually fall from, uh, the, the values. 210 00:15:49,839.9999999998836 --> 00:15:54,832 And once you have the values, then you can answer the question, how do we make decisions?
(15:56):
And with the decision-making framework, then you can say, "Okay, so you're responsible for marketing.
Those are the 4, 5 areas that where you're going to focus on, and this is how you make decisions, and you have"
some startups put a budget value saying you can make, you can spend up to 10,000 without asking for anything.
(16:19):
.0000000001164If there is anything that concerns another department, you have to make the decision with them. 215 00:16:24,910.0000000001164 --> 00:16:29,540 If there's anything that goes over that budget, you have to make the decision with the rest of the team.
.0000000001164And that provides people with what I like to call it a playpen. 217 00:16:34,410.0000000001164 --> 00:16:37,730 It just says, "This, this is my, my little box."
Yeah.
.0000000001164"I can play and do whatever I want in there, and if I want to play outside of that, I need to go work for some- somebody else." 220 00:16:47,829.9999999998836 --> 00:17:01,310 And from there, you can then build everything within the, within the business, because everyone knows how to make decision, everyone knows what the values are, and I think Niium is probably the best company I've seen using their values.
(17:01):
.0000000001164So, we, we did that value workshop and they, uh, they were looking for investment. 222 00:17:08,410.0000000001164 --> 00:17:25,552.0000000001164 So, Niium does green ammonia, and BP wanted to invest in them, they wanted to buy the technology, but BP's values don't align with Niium's values, and they refused a very, very large investment because they were not aligned. 223 00:17:27,150.00000000011642 --> 00:17:27,869.9999999998836 Interesting. 224 00:17:27,869.9999999998836 --> 00:17:32,170 That's how, that's how, that's how impactful it can be.
(17:32):
And now they, they are growing, they're scaling.
.00000000023283They've just released their first, um, reactor, so like a proper full-scale reactor, shipped it to Australia, and i- it is just a- amazing how having that value focus helps you do a lot more with a lot less.
(17:55):
I remember when, when we were doing this workshop that one of, one of the things that kind of guided us was
Uh, I don't remember who said that principle, but it was very similar to what you said.
It was values, like how do you know that you've picked the right mission statement and the right value, uh, the right values?
Be painful.
If your values are, are kind of, like, bland and it's like, you know
(18:21):
Integrity, trust.
Yeah, but like, if you don't pick a value that's like
It's a hill that you will die on, so to speak.
Exactly, yeah.
It's like, at some point during my company's life, I will come across a decision where money might lead me to one place, but my values will lead me to another place, and it will be a painful decision.
(18:44):
But that's the value that I want, or at least that's the value that as a founder, let's move to third person, that's the value that as a, as a founder, you should pick.
The one that's painful because that's the one that defines your company's DNA and your company's culture.
Absolutely.
.99999999976717And have you had 241 00:19:05,409.99999999976717 --> 00:19:07,830 So, let's kind of continue and build on that.
(19:07):
Have you had in- instances where you kind of did this process and then you realized, "Yeah, they're not gonna do it."
Like, "These are not"
You know, they, they
Okay, they, they, you know, they speak the speak, but they don't walk the walk.
Like, "I don't see how this founder, the CEO, or someone else, like, from, from, like, upper management is actually, like, going to live up to those values."
(19:33):
Quite a few times.
Yes, I was afraid you're gonna say that.
But that's, that's what you're saying, right?
.9999999997672The, the challenge is when you found the business, when you're, when you're a founder, you're there, you want to solve a problem, and at the same time, it's a business, you, you need to make money, and, uh, there's always the fear that you're going to fail, and you don't want to fail. 251 00:20:01,659.9999999997672 --> 00:20:02,670 Like, that's go
(20:02):
The, the greatest, greatest pain you could feel is the failure of, of that business, because you attach
.9999999997672It's your baby, you're attached to it. 254 00:20:10,889.9999999997672 --> 00:20:25,940 And when you have 2 months' runway and you have a, a big investor that comes in and say, "Well, I give you the 3 million that you need to, to scale, but you have to do things our way," it's a very difficult decision.
(20:25):
It's either, you're going to feel like a failure because you, you didn't take that investment, and, and you have also the attachment to do the team and the people who invested in you early stage, and it's kind of, you don't want to fail them.
You don't want to feel like a failure, and you don't want to f- fail the people who are working with you.
So, it's, it's a very difficult decision.
(20:47):
That's one thing that sometimes makes people say, "Well, okay, we'll take that investment and we'll work it out."
Right?
We, as human, we have an optimism bias, and think that, "Well, I can smoke 10 a day and doesn't do anything to me," right?
"I'll, I'll, I'll be safe.
It doesn't"
It's, it's the same kind of, same kind of thinking.
(21:09):
And there is, the other thing is, what most founders find very difficult, and I think it's more most leader fi- find really difficult, is the fact that behave, uh, like, aligning your behavior to your values sometimes goes, uh, your business values sometimes go against your personal values.
(21:32):
And that means doing some self-reflection work, means, uh, changing your behavior, and that's very, very difficult.
Like, no one changes unless they see the need to change themselves.
So, as a, as a coach, I could tell you, "Well, this is what I see, and you can change this way, this way, or this way."
(21:53):
If you don't see the value in changing, you're never gonna, going to change.
And that's usually the most difficult thing for founders, is having to self-reflect, realize the tension between the business need and the, the personal, like, personal challenge, do that self-reflection, and then say, "I need to change my behavior so that my business will benefit."
(22:19):
Yeah.
Um, I feel your categories with us.
Um, and have you, no, have you gotten into instances where, you know, you were approached by a potential customer, and then you kind of started the exploration and you're like, "Okay, no, this is not a founder I can work with"?
(22:41):
Um, I- Like pushing back on, on a project because you felt, you know, like, it doesn't, it won't work?
I haven't, and at the same time, I hope I have learned and will do it in the future.
Because there has been a couple of engagements that didn't finish as I would have hoped, and where the implementing those changes were very, very difficult, and the changes didn't happen, so I failed in what I said I was going to, to accomplish, and they felt that they had failed as well.
(23:16):
But there's been a, a
And it was m- early on in, uh, when I was more, uh, freelancing rather than, uh, than fractional.
There's been one engagement that I re- remember particularly, where I managed to get the team together.
.99999999976717So, I was still in CX. 280 00:23:36,139.99999999976717 --> 00:23:47,400 I managed to get the team together, and then when I asked, I spoke with the leaders around the business and say, "This behavior across the business needs to change if you want CX to be successful."
(23:47):
And that didn't, didn't happen.
So we ended up, we ended the relationship, and what happened is then that 3 weeks after I had left, 60% of the CX team had left.
Wow.
That's a lot.
It's a, it's a big
Uh, and, uh, I'd spent 9 months recruiting for that team.
(24:09):
Did the founder reach back to you after, after that?
No.
.00000000023283They were too, too prideful, I guess, to-
Yeah.
Yeah, that sounds hard.
But it was interesting, um, side, sidetracking.
You said, uh, "That was earlier when I was freelancing, and not fractional."
(24:30):
And I, I wanna, uh, go back to that, because I think some of the listeners, or watchers, will, will ponder on the difference.
So, how do you define the difference?
So, freelance, I was full-time with a business for 6 months, and it was usually 6 months rolling contracts.
So, it's full-time with one business.
(24:52):
As a fractional, I currently have 3 clients.
Okay.
And I, I am one day a week with each client.
Well, one day a week with 2 clients, and there's one w- that's more ad hoc work.
When they, when they need me, I'm here and I do, I do the work for, for them.
So, freelance is more jumping from project to project, and fractional is very much- By doing one at a time?
(25:17):
Yeah.
And fractional is embedding, I am part of the team.
I am their head of people, chief, chief, chief people 0 officer, people expert, whatever title they want to give me.
I, I don't mind very much.
.9999999997672But I am their, I am their people person, and I will help them develop their business and their culture in a way that will help them grow and scale.
(25:40):
Got it.
Okay, thank you for that clarification.
Um, have you, um, have you ever had someone reach out with, like, uh, an emergency, everything's-on-fire situation, where they're like, "Stef, I need you yesterday.
The building's on fire."
Everyone's with the puking emoji.
"Come and fix this."
(26:00):
Yeah, I've, I've had that, uh, a couple of times.
A couple of times?
Okay.
Um
And it's-Usually on specific issues.
And that's why I started doing the power hours, where I jump on a call with the founder or whatever th- who, the lea- leader was experiencing the, the problem and we solve the problem together.
(26:20):
.9999999997672Uh, one of them was a team member who was regularly sick and, and not pulling their weight when they were, when they were there. 322 00:26:31,514.9999999997672 --> 00:26:42,056 So what we, we did is, uh, go back and work out what's the sick leave policy?
(26:42):
What do we do?
How do we support the team members?
.9999999997672Because the business really wanted to support the team members in being, uh, like healthy, sorting their 326 00:26:51,985.9999999997672 --> 00:26:56,400 Have the time to sort their health issues and then be able to contribute to the team.
And, uh, so that really helped the business establish that, that structure.
And the team member decided that they want
(27:04):
They were going to leave because of this.
When they
.99999999976717there was a little bit of scrutiny into what they were doing, they didn't feel comfortable with that, so they decided to leave. 332 00:27:15,14.99999999976717 --> 00:27:21,116 And the other one was a, a client I speak with on and off quite regularly.
And it was like 9:00 at night and I got a
(27:25):
get a call and say, "Look, we've got this-" That's never a good sign.
They don't usually call.
Like, we're not
That is a phone call.
.99999999976717Yeah. 339 00:27:33,255.99999999976717 --> 00:27:35,775 That's like really, everything's on fire.
And they had hired someone who was supposed to start the next day.
And realized that actually what they wanted to do with the role, h- that person wasn't the right person and the role needed to change quite tremendously.
(27:52):
That's
That's
Okay.
.0000000002328That's hard. 346 00:27:55,956.0000000002328 --> 00:27:56,106 So, because
So things that happened in the business, they wanted to pivot a little bit and they realized that role then wasn't relevant anymore and the person couldn't fit in the new role, the new direction they were, they were going into.
And what we worked out is, um, to call the candidate very early in the morning and offer them a severance package, even though they hadn't started to say, "Look, we're very sorry.
(28:27):
We- we've messed up.
But here is 3 months worth of money and a reference, so that you can find something else."
That's generous.
It wa- it was very generous and e- I
That's the kind of clients I want to work with, right?
"We, we made a mistake, we're going to fix it."
.999999999767169And it's to the benefit of the business because it helped their reputation. 356 00:28:51,5.999999999767169 --> 00:28:52,976 So they worked in a- Yeah.
(28:52):
.9999999997672in a small city in Denmark and they are one of the main employers.
So there are, there are a lot of people who knows about them and they know that the word is going to go around.
So that- Yeah.
benefits their reputation and at the same time, the person wasn't left in the lurch, lurch without any money.
.99999999976717Exactly.
.9999999997672I know a lot of businesses that would just say, "Sorry."
(29:16):
"Bye."
"Good luck."
And I've, I've heard- "Maybe you quit your job for us.
.00000000023283Maybe you turned down 3 other offers last week."
"Sorry.
Good luck."
Yeah.
Yeah.
"We're a business.
Our bottom line matters more than you."
Yeah.
Yeah.
I guess those are not the types of founders that you want.
All right.
(29:36):
Well, that kinda leads me to, to our next segment.
Though I think we touched on that a bit, but, uh, um, let's see if maybe we can find another one of your fracked up
one of your most fracked up moments.
So something that maybe, you know, you mentioned that w- with all the s- like a ton of the CX team leaving earlier in your career.
(29:59):
But maybe something a bit more recent that comes to mind of a fracked up moment.
Something that didn't really work out as planned.
.99999999976717A CEO sending me a list of people in WhatsApp.
And I, I was kind of, "I don't want anything to do with that.
I want you to fire them."
And it's kind of, "Well, why?
(30:21):
Why do you want me to fire them?"
"Uh, they're not doing the
They're"
Okay.
So some of those people are very junior, and I'm pretty sure he never spoke with them.
"How do you know they're not doing their job?"
"I spoke with people in the team, and they said that they didn't like that person."
And I was just kind of.
(30:41):
Breathe in, breathe out.
So I said, "Just leave it with me, and I will investigate with those people's manager, and I will un- understand what's going on, and we will do what's, uh, what's needed."
So I, I went to all of the managers.
I looked at the person's performance, how their goals were set, the feedback they got, and the majority of the, the staff were fairly new, hadn't had any training, and were fairly junior in their career as well.
(31:12):
And so the team that had been there for a long time knew what to do, and they were just kind of, "Well, do this thing."
It's kind of, "Well, I don't know how to do this thing.
Can you teach me?"
A- and that hadn't happened.
Uh, so I helped the manager put a, like, goals in place and a plan, uh, and, uh, 3 quarters improved their performance because they received the training, and then about a quarter had to leave because they were not performing.
(31:41):
Uh, but that, um, managing by hearsay, uh, I, I was
The mind-blown emoji is a good one.
Exactly.
We'll call this the emoji episode, but yes.
Wow.
So 3 quarters ended up staying.
Yep.
Amazing.
(32:03):
Okay.
That is a fracked-up moment.
Thank you-
for that.
Uh, that's one, that one's gonna keep me up at night.
So let's, um, let's switch gears and go into our quickfire round.
So I'll ask you a few questions and just happy to hear your, your thoughts.
Um, and I'll, I'll, I'll start with a bit of a controversy.
(32:24):
So frack or fiction?
Fractional HR is just a fancy name for a recruiter.
Fiction. 423 00:32:34,860.0000000002328 --> 00:32:36,960 Do you want to add a sentence to that?
Um, so a fractional HR can do recruitment.
They will add a lot more value if they don't only do recruitment.
(32:47):
And you'd probably get a lot more value out of an agency, a recruitment agency or an embedded recruiter, because I can do recruitment, but it's not my main skill.
So, so it's a thing that I have done, and I happily do it quite regularly.
And at the same time, I'm better at building teams.
So I'm good at, at choosing the people, but the, all the, the admin that goes behind the, the recruitment, you need a specialist to be able to do that most effectively and actually source the, the right candidates and, and things like that.
(33:24):
Okay.
That's a very solid answer.
What is the one tool in your toolbox that you swear by?
ChatGPT.
Oh, it's I use it for that now.
Um, the reason I'm saying this is, so Asana records all of my meetings.
(33:47):
It helps me keep track of all the things I have to do.
It helps me improve as well because I can get it to look across all of my meeting and saying, "What are the trends?
How can I improve?"
So I use it as a, as a coach as well.
.9999999997672And whenever I'm working on the project, if I don't have a, a team wi- with me, I use it to brainstorm initially, and then I have a better idea of where we can go before I take that to the teams I work with. 441 00:34:20,739.9999999997672 --> 00:34:28,139.99999999976717 So it's initial brainstorm, I get an idea of what we, we should be doing, then I take it to the team and say, "I'm thinking about that. 442 00:34:28,139.99999999976717 --> 00:34:30,384 How does that work for, for the team?"
(34:31):
And research as well. 444 00:34:33,320.00000000023283 --> 00:34:38,520 So when, when I need to understand, so we're having that problem, where does that come from?
Is there psychology attached to it?
Is there research atta- uh, attached to it?
So it helps me understand problems better.
.00000000023283And so that I don't have to be on Google for days before I get the information I need. 449 00:34:52,300.00000000023283 --> 00:34:54,096 It just does all that in seconds.
(34:55):
Okay.
What's your definition of a dream client versus a nightmare client?
We kind of touched on that earlier, but let's, let's recap that into a-
something.
Um, a dream client is a client who understand that putting their people first is going to benefit their business in the long run.
(35:22):
Uh, it's like, to me, it's like building a house.
You wouldn't build a house if you didn't have the foundations.
The foundations is the frameworks that you need for your people to work together and then prioritizing your people in every decision you're making.
And once you have that in place, your people are going to do the job, and they will be doing the job more, much more effectively than if you just put a jumble of people together and, and tell them, "Collaborate."
(35:48):
collaborate is a big word.
It's, what does that mean?
Yeah.
How do we work?
Um, and a nightmare client is somebody who sends me a list of people and tells me, "You need to fire them."
Send you a list of people on WhatsApp with, with a fire emoji.Okay.
Where do you see, and that's a big one, I know, but where do you see the future of Fractional?
(36:13):
I see that as the key to success for small businesses.
And not, not only start-ups, it's all small businesses because there are a lot of, of businesses that have, like, 30, 40 people who have a random operations person handle pretty much everything.
(36:36):
And it might be fun and exciting if they are a generalist, and sometimes they will need the knowledge of a specialist.
S- so if I, if I take an office manager, for instance, they're going to organize the events, they're going to do DHL, they're going to do the managing the office, they're going to help people sort things out, do the contracts and all of that.
(37:01):
Having a Fractional person helps take all of the, the admin and organizing things away so that the operations person can actually make sure that everything is working together the way it should.
And, uh, it can give a small business access to marketing or to, uh, more sales, or to a proper finance person rather than trying to do your, your accounts at the end of the year and not being sure.
(37:29):
Like, my, my accountant, uh, fired a client recently because the client came to them with 2 bag full of receipts-
and told them- That feels very outdated.
If they'd had a Fractional person doing their bookkeeping, like, one day a month, their, their accounting bill at the end of the year would have been a lot less expensive- Exactly.
(37:55):
and they would be saving a lot more money because they're managing their accounts better.
Okay.
That's an interesting, uh, perspective, and one that I don't hear often, 'cause I think a lot of, of the Fractionals that I, that I've been talking to are very, very focused on tech, start-ups, so that's kind of, like, a bit of a left field perspective and I like that.
(38:17):
Okay, so we're kinda gearing up to, um, towards the, the wrap up of, of this episode, but I do have one final question, uh, and that's one that I really, really like.
One of, one of the, the personas that I hope is listening to, to these episodes, to this podcast, is people who are maybe still a bit earlier in their career path, maybe still full time and, and kinda thinking about going Fractional or aspiring to be, like, a Fractional leader.
(38:51):
Uh, if you could give one piece of advice to someone like that, what would that be?
Start building your brand before you go Fractional, because you need that, what's the word?
Social proof.
And so we, what we said is most of the Fractional contract we get is referrals. 484 00:39:11,663.9999999995343 --> 00:39:22,484 But when a friend of mine is te- telling John that, uh, they should contact Steph, what John is going to do is go on social, find Steph, see what she's saying- Exactly.
(39:22):
before they're talking to her.
So you need to have that social proof so that people can relate to you and is kind of, "Well, okay, so Steph has done a podcast.
.9999999995343She is, she doesn't want to work with people who send a, a list of, of people to fire. 488 00:39:38,663.9999999995343 --> 00:39:40,624 That's not my kind of Fractional person."
.00000000046566Uh, you can- Yeah. 490 00:39:42,104.00000000046566 --> 00:39:50,444 you can make those, so you filter people and you also build your social proof and your expertise out there.
(39:50):
The other one would be network freely.
So find who you want to target and network with those people with no expectations. 493 00:40:00,163.99999999953434 --> 00:40:06,424 I'm do- I'm doing that a lot and I get to, a lot of very early stage founders saying, "Can we jump on a call?
I have an idea.
I need to brainstorm."
And I, I do that with quite a lot of people because I'm interested in, on what people, people are thinking about- Yeah.
(40:16):
and it's building my network.
And through that, I've had some referrals, intro- introductions as well.
So you're, you're building your network that way, by helping without expecting anything, and at the same time, you're, you're learning.
So that would be the, the 2 things.
And when you launch, like, in the market currently, you have 6 months to a year runway.
(40:38):
If you're launching without any client lined up already, have 6 months to a year runway, because there's going to be a lot of grind before you find clients.
That's a golden tip, and I think a really, really important one as well.
Yeah.
Especially if you want to kind of have a more structured and maybe saner first few months- Yeah.
(41:04):
to a year of, of a Fractional journey, because it does tend to be a bit of a roller coaster, um, when you start out, at least in terms of, like, balancing client work and, and outreach and finding those initial opportunities.
Yeah, yeah.
And it also reminded, uh, so what I learned as a freelancer, it's a little bit feast and famine.
So the way I do it now is I have 3 to 4 days of client work, and then one day where I'm going to do all of my outreach and all of my connecting and meeting with other people, so that instead of having up and down, I still have up and downs, but they're not, they're not as big.
(41:43):
Kind of flattening the graph in a good way.
Okay.
Those are fantastic tips.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Okay.
So that brings us to the end of the episode, uh, but before we wrap up, Steph, uh, if anyone wants to reach out, so obviously, um, I'll make sure your, your LinkedIn, um, is in the show notes, so anyone who wants to reach out, um, will and, and can find you.
(42:08):
Um, is there any specific
So again, we talked about, if you're a founder that plans on dropping a list of people you want to fire on WhatsApp at 9:00 PM, then Steph is probably not the person to reach out to.
Uh, but is there a specific kind of, of, of profile that, that
if, if, if you're a founder listening and you have this challenge, Steph is, is the person to reach out to?
(42:33):
Uh, yeah, so, uh, it's startups that it's post-seed gearing to Series A usually, so when you're starting scaling, because what happens is when you're starting scaling, you're bringing a lot more people in, and that starts changing the culture of the business.
So if you want to maintain effectiveness and the culture of your business at the same time, is just before you start hiring, I'm a good person to, to call.
(43:02):
Okay.
I can say that, uh, I've, I've been in a lot of, uh, in a lot of those stages in, in, in different companies, and that's definitely a stage where I wish I had-
someone like you to talk to.
It's when things just go past.
Um, would, would have saved me a lot of, a lot of, uh, a lot of growing pains, yes.
(43:24):
Thank you.
Okay.
So that wraps up our episode for today, so, um, if you're listening, if you're watching us on YouTube, um, thank you first of all, and I hope you enjoyed this episode.
Uh, if you enjoyed our conversation today, please like, follow, subscribe, leave a review, leave a comment, share the episode with a founder or, or a fellow Fractional, um, and Steph, thank you so much.
(43:51):
Uh- Uh, it's been a pleasure, and thank you for, for everyone listening.
I look forward to hearing from you.
Same here.
Thank you.
Bye.
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