EXECUTIVE HIRING GUIDE
How to Hire a Fractional CRO or Head of Sales
Hire a Fractional CRO when the company needs executive ownership of the entire revenue system. Hire a Head of Sales when the strategy and operating model are sound but the sales team needs day-to-day management. The decision should follow the problem, not the title.
WHO IT IS FOR
Which companies are the best fit?
CEOs, founders, investors, and boards deciding whether the immediate gap is strategy, revenue-system leadership, sales management, or a permanent executive seat.
EXPECTED RESULT
What should leadership expect?
A good hire produces clarity quickly: what is broken, what must change, who owns it, which evidence matters, and whether the company needs a Fractional CRO, sales leader, or permanent CRO next.
ROLE COMPARISON
Which role matches the operating gap?
| Role | Use when | Scope |
|---|---|---|
| Fractional CRO | The revenue system needs executive diagnosis, redesign, and operating ownership | GTM, sales, marketing alignment, RevOps, forecast, pricing, channels, retention, and board reporting |
| Head of Sales | The GTM system is sound and the sales team needs daily management | Sales execution, coaching, hiring, pipeline management, and team performance |
| Full-time CRO | The company has a durable C-suite mandate requiring continuous leadership | Long-term revenue strategy, organization, budget, cross-functional leadership, and results |
OPERATING PRESSURES
What should be diagnosed before opening the role?
- Founder-led sales no longer produces a teachable motion
- Pipeline and forecast cannot support board decisions
- Sales performance is weak, but the root cause may involve ICP, pricing, marketing, product, channels, or delivery
- A previous sales or CRO hire inherited an unclear mandate and insufficient authority
MANDATE
What should a strong Fractional CRO be able to own?
- Revenue diagnosis and a prioritized 90-day operating plan
- GTM, pipeline, forecasting, RevOps, pricing, channels, retention, and executive cadence
- Coaching and accountability across revenue leaders, not only individual selling
- Role definition, permanent hiring support, and capability transfer
FIRST 90 DAYS
A sector-specific operating sequence
- Test revenue evidence before accepting the existing diagnosis
- Clarify mandate, authority, access, CEO expectations, and board reporting
- Publish a short list of material risks and immediate decisions
- Install the operating cadence and repair the highest-value constraint
- Define scorecards for leadership, pipeline, forecast, and adoption
- Make organization and permanent-role recommendations from observed evidence
- Show whether the system and team can sustain the new decisions
- Document business movement, unresolved constraints, and next-stage priorities
- Agree to extend, narrow, transition, or conclude the mandate based on evidence
METRICS
Which indicators should move?
- Qualified pipeline and coverage
- Forecast stability
- Win rate and sales velocity
- Gross-margin and pricing quality
- Seller productivity and manager cadence
- Customer retention and expansion
ENGAGEMENT FIT
Who should not hire this service?
Do not hire a Fractional CRO as a disguised individual contributor, a commission-only closer, a replacement for product-market fit, or a leader without decision access and executive sponsorship.
Scope boundary: The written mandate should define authority, confidentiality, conflicts, expected availability, data access, decision rights, success measures, transition conditions, and what remains with the CEO and board.
OPERATING AUTHORITY
What evidence supports Andre’s approach?
Andre Magrini led the AGI Brazil operation as it scaled from approximately $35M to more than $150M in revenue through commercial organization, channel execution, management cadence, and P&L accountability. This is historical operating context, not a promise of future performance.
Read the documented AGI operating caseFAQ
Questions buyers ask before engaging
What is the difference between a Fractional CRO and a Head of Sales?
A Head of Sales primarily manages sales execution and the sales team. A Fractional CRO typically owns the broader revenue system, including market focus, sales, marketing alignment, RevOps, forecast, channels, pricing, retention, and executive reporting.
What should be in a Fractional CRO contract?
Define mandate, deliverables, authority, access, weekly cadence, confidentiality, conflicts, success measures, fees, termination, intellectual property, and the transition or capability-transfer plan.
How should references be checked?
Ask references about the exact operating context, decisions owned, behavior under pressure, evidence created, capability transferred, and what did not work. General praise is less useful than comparable operating detail.
What should happen before a full-time CRO search?
Clarify the actual constraint, stabilize critical routines, define the future mandate and scorecard, and determine which capabilities must be permanent. Otherwise the search may optimize for the wrong profile.
RELATED GUIDES
Continue the evaluation
Diagnose the operating constraint before choosing the solution.
Start with the revenue fingerprint, evidence, and decision rights.
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