What does a Fractional Head of Product do?

A fractional Head of Product owns your product direction. That means defining strategy, prioritising the roadmap, running discovery, aligning stakeholders, and making sure engineering builds the right things.

They attend planning sessions, shape sprint goals, and make sure each feature connects to a commercial outcome. The only real difference from a full-time hire is the schedule: it's the same job, done in fewer days.

A fractional Head of Product isn't a product manager. They don't write user stories all day or manage a Jira backlog.

They set the direction, put a way of prioritising in place, and coach your team to make good product decisions on their own. If you need someone to write tickets, you need a PM. If you need someone to set the direction those tickets come from, you need a Head of Product.

Most fractional engagements run 2–3 days per week, either on-site, remote, or a mix. We work in your team's tools and meetings (Slack, standups, planning sessions), so we don't lose context between our days.

The engagement usually starts with a diagnostic period to understand your product, market and team, then moves into hands-on leadership.

Typically founders or CTOs at seed to Series B companies who know they need product leadership but aren't ready for a full-time hire.

Sometimes it's a bridge while you recruit permanently. Sometimes it's the right long-term model for the stage you're at. Either way, you get senior product thinking without taking on the overhead too early.

Fractional Head of Product engagements typically cost 20–40% of what a full-time hire would cost when you factor in salary, equity, benefits, and employer NI.

The exact cost depends on the number of days per week and the complexity of the engagement. Most of our engagements are structured as monthly retainers for predictability on both sides.