FaCTOR gives small companies access to a seasoned CTO at a fraction of the cost of a full time individual and with limited commitment. A FaCTOR CTO will work as much as 2 days per week or as little as one day per month at a set cost to manage to on-going needs of your buinesse’s IT unit. A FaCTOR CTO is your CTO all the time. No contracts, no hidden costs, no up-front fees. FaCTOR accepts no referral fees (although we do pay them). Our only motivation to recommend a product, vendor or service is that we believe it is the best option for your company.
Why and when do I need a fractional CTO?
All companies need IT Strategy and Management. The responsibility for providing this vital function in a small business often falls to the owner, office manager, accountant or IT Service Provider (MSP). This works for some companies some of the time, but there are pitfalls.
- Internal Staff has Limitations: Your office manager or accountant may not have time to field questions and complaints about IT strategy and service management – heaven knows the owner doesn’t. And being honest, they may not be very good at it.
- Your MSP has Limitations: Your MSP is probably only willing to do the work that they are contracted to do and will most likely leave items like vendor management, regulatory compliance, invoice review and the business analysis that goes into making your applications work to you. And if they do agree to do these things it may be at a high hourly fee and you may have to wait weeks or months to get it done. And the typical MSP isn’t an objective source of recommendations because they will ultimately need to sell you the solution they support. If this doesn’t describe your MSP then treat your unicorn well.
- You need Continuity: Your MSP, external vendors and your internal team may shuffle around as they grow and change which may mean you get a new person every year or two. That person may have an interest in your needs or may not. The Management and Strategy role for an MSP is basically a sales role and the individual’s interest will depend in part on the sales potential he sees in your company.
- You Need to Take it up a Notch: You know that your technology isn’t meeting the needs of the company. Your team complains more about the computer system that manages the company’s work. Your MSP is complaining that your system needs to be updated but you’re afraid to because of the in-place systems. Your suppliers and customers are using much better systems than you have. You know you need to improve but you don’t know how.
