Fractional & interim leadership

Executive capability, without the permanent hire.

Some organisations don't need a report. They need someone senior in the chair for a while — to hold the technology agenda, run the transformation, or steady the function until the right permanent leader is found.

The gap

Too much for the IT manager. Not enough for a CIO.

Between roughly $20m and $120m of revenue, most organisations sit in an awkward middle. Technology carries real consequence — safety, compliance, margin, reputation — but the volume of genuinely executive work doesn't justify a full-time executive salary, and hiring one is a twelve-month bet on a market you can't easily read.

Meanwhile the operational IT lead, internal or outsourced, is competent and fully occupied keeping things running. Asking them to also set strategy, challenge vendors, prepare board papers and lead a transformation is neither fair nor effective.

A fractional or interim arrangement closes that gap honestly: real executive capability, a defined commitment, and a clear end point.

Engagement types

Three ways this typically works.

Fractional CIO / CTO

Ongoing, part-time, in the chair.

One to three days a week holding the technology agenda: strategy and roadmap, investment governance, vendor and contract leadership, cyber and risk oversight, board and executive reporting, and coaching of the internal team. Typically twelve months, reviewed quarterly.

Interim executive

Full weight, defined period.

Stepping into a vacant technology executive role — through a departure, a search process, an acquisition or a period of instability. Runs the function, steadies the team, keeps commitments moving, and hands over to the permanent appointment with the ground genuinely prepared.

Transformation lead

Accountable for the change, not just the plan.

Leading a defined business and technology transformation end to end — process, operating model, platform, governance and adoption — while the executive team keeps running the business. Ends when the change is embedded, not when the software is installed.

Board technology adviser

A technology voice at the table.

Attending board or audit and risk committee meetings as an independent technology adviser: interrogating papers before approval, translating technical risk into governance language, and giving directors somewhere to take the question they'd rather not ask in the meeting.

What you get

Someone who has done the job.

Twenty years of senior technology leadership, to CIO and Group Executive level.
Comfort at board level — GAICD qualified, with a track record of board reporting.
Commercial and vendor teeth: major contract negotiation and governance experience.
Cyber and regulatory fluency across ISO 27001, SOCI Act and Essential Eight.
A genuine record of building and lifting teams, not just restructuring them.
Independence maintained — no vendor commissions, in this role or any other.

How it's structured

Clear terms, clear exit.

One to four days per week, agreed in advance and held to.
Minimum three months; typically six to twelve for fractional arrangements.
Monthly fee, not day-rate creep. Reviewed quarterly against value delivered.
Written mandate: decision rights, reporting line and success measures up front.
Knowledge transfer and succession planned from the first month.
Perth-based; on-site regularly, remote in between, nationally where needed.

A note on independence

Where InArena holds a fractional or interim role, it does not also sell implementation, licences or delivery resources into that organisation. The advice is the only product. That constraint costs revenue, and it is exactly what makes the counsel worth having.

Discuss an arrangement