Another type of work?
Before we talk about Fractional work let’s define what we all learned growing up.
Full-time Employee – A w2 position at a company, typically for 40 hours/week. Paid an annual salary.
Part-time Employee – A w2 position at a company, typically for any amount of hours under 35/week. Set hours are not guaranteed. Paid a rate per hour.
Independent Contractor – A 1099 role with a company. You are technically not an employee of the company. You are your own business. You work out an agreement for hours and pay rate. You could potentially work anywhere from 0-40 hours per week. Commonly you are working on a project for a defined amount of time.
Freelancer – Basically the same as an independent contractor.
Okay, so now where does Fractional fit in?
Fractional is when an Independent Contractor divides their time up each week amongst a small number of clients. The worker makes an agreement with a company to work X hours per week for Y dollars per month. The worker generally is with the company ongoing and treated more like a part of the company rather than temporary help.
The Company Perspective
The benefits to a company of hiring a fractional worker include:
– Being able to work with high-level, experienced talent at an affordable price because they are not needed full-time.
– None of the expenses of salary, benefits, or overhead from employing a full-time person.
The Fractional Worker's Perspective
The benefits to being a fractional worker include:
– Spreading your eggs across multiple baskets. If, for example you are working 10 hrs/week per company for 4 companies and one of the companies ends your work together, you will still have 75% of your income until you find a new client vs if you worked full-time for 1 company and were fired you would immediately have no income.
– Depending on your financial goals, you might decide not to work 40 hrs/week. You might even make more working only 30 hours/week than you did working 40 hours/week as a full-time employee.
– Avoid boredom by working for multiple companies and having some variety in your day.
Fractional Worker Titles
Fractional roles typically are for C-suite level positions, most commonly you will see the CMO, Chief Marketing Officer. In this example, a company may have 1 or a few employees handling the company website and marketing, and they want someone very experienced to come in and manage them, but they can’t afford that salary; the solution being to hire a fractional CMO.
That’s my brief overview of Fractional Work. How is your company doing these days? Would you benefit from a fractional worker joining your team to manage your company’s online presence?
Meir is a web developer who has been writing code since 2000. He enjoys his family, movies, cooking, golf, and bowling.
