All of a sudden, everyone's fractional.

Fractional CMO. Fractional CFO. Fractional CRO. Fractional sanity.

It's the new epidemic of modern business......leadership as a subscription service.

The model sounds brilliant in theory: get senior talent without the full-time cost. In practice? It's a carousel of consultants playing executive dress-up. They parachute in, write a strategy deck, host a few "alignment" calls, and disappear before the hard part starts.

I've watched three portfolio companies burn through five fractional CMOs in 18 months. None of them remember the company names. One billed for a "brand refresh" that was literally the same deck they'd delivered to another portco six months earlier. Just find-and-replace on the logo.

There's a use case. If you need a specialist to clean up a mess, prep for a transaction, or set a short-term direction, a fractional operator can be a great stopgap. But as a system? It's unsustainable.