The operating cadence, owned and run.
The CEO who is also running operations is the most common structural problem in growth-stage companies — not because the CEO cannot do it, but because the company cannot afford the cost of having her do it. When the CEO is the de facto COO, the strategic decisions that would accelerate the business are perpetually deferred in favour of the operating decisions that need to happen today. The Atelier fractional COO takes the operating system off the CEO's desk. Throughput. Service levels. Working capital. The weekly cadence that connects demand to supply to cash — owned and run, week to week, by a senior operator who has carried the number at comparable scale.
What the engagement covers
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- 01
Weekly operating review: owned metrics, exception management, decision authority.
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S&OP connecting the demand plan to the supply plan to the cash position on a rolling six-week horizon.
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Fulfilment, manufacturing, and logistics performance managed to plan.
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Working capital — inventory, payables, receivables — managed as an operating metric, not a finance metric.
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Direct management of the VP/director-level operations team.
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Operating performance reporting to the CEO and board.
Who engages a Fractional COO
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- 01
CEOs at $20–100M revenue who recognise that operations is consuming their strategic bandwidth.
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Boards and PE sponsors who see operating underperformance but do not want to replace the CEO.
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Growth-stage companies scaling through a step-change in volume that the current operating team cannot manage alone.
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Founder-led businesses preparing for a COO hire who want to install the operating model before the permanent seat is filled.
Engagement structure
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Typically 2–3 days per week. Minimum six-month commitment. Performance reviewed monthly against agreed operating KPIs. Common initial focus: install the weekly operating cadence in the first 30 days; stabilise the key metrics in days 30–90; hand operating ownership to a strengthened internal team by month 12.
Where the boundary sits
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Not a supply chain consultant producing a report on what should be done differently — she is running the operation, and the difference is visible in the first thirty days.
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Not a substitute for a permanent COO when the business is ready for one — the mandate builds toward the handover.
Where this discipline compounds.
If the operating layer is not carrying the plan, a scoped conversation is the fastest route to a plan that holds.
Engage
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