Fractional COO & Advisory Services
Growth-stage founders don't need more advice. They need operators who've been in the weeds — and can build the systems, teams, and infrastructure to scale without them.
The problem
You know the bottlenecks. You've tried to address them. But every hour you spend in the weeds is an hour you're not spending on what only you can do.
Great people stuck in broken processes underperform. The problem isn't talent — it's the infrastructure your organization hasn't built yet.
The habits that got you to growth stage will actively work against you at the next level. You need to rebuild the engine while the car is moving.
Frameworks and decks don't fix operations. You need operators who get embedded, tell you what's actually true, and help you execute the solution.
What we offer
We work with a focused number of growth-stage founders at any given time. Every engagement is designed around one goal: building operational infrastructure that scales without you being in every room.
A focused two-hour diagnostic and strategy call. You bring your most pressing operational challenge. We bring pattern recognition from 40+ years in the trenches. You leave with a written recommendation.
Individual contributors are promoted into management for their technical excellence — and then left to figure out leadership on their own. This full-day workshop closes that gap with practical tools and honest frameworks.
Defined scope, defined outcome. We embed with your team for a fixed duration to solve a specific operational problem — whether that's a broken supply chain, a restructure, or a cross-functional alignment issue.
For founders who need an operational leader in their corner on an ongoing basis — attending key meetings, holding accountability, and helping build the team and systems to scale.
As we launch Headroom Advisors, we are offering five complimentary advisory sessions to founders with real operational challenges. This is not a sales call. It is a genuine working session.
3 of 5 slots filled
Who we are
We have owned P&L responsibility, managed cross-functional teams, and made decisions that moved the needle on businesses at scale. We bring that to every engagement.
Mariam has owned P&L responsibility for a $40M+ aerospace business unit with direct accountability for strategy, customer relationships, supply chain, manufacturing, and engineering. She brings a systems-first lens to operational problems — identifying root causes, restructuring processes, and building organizations that scale without requiring the founder in every room.
Sean spent nearly 14 years at Boeing leading large-scale organizational change across $56B business units, directing cross-functional teams spanning manufacturing, supply chain, engineering, and IT. He now runs SG Enterprises and teaches engineering management at CSUN. He brings the rare combination of enterprise-scale operational rigor and the grounded instincts of a business owner.
Work with us
We review every application personally. If your problem is a good fit, we will be in touch within 48 hours. No pitch, no pressure — just a direct conversation about whether we can help.
Past initial traction, with a real operational challenge limiting your next stage of growth
Founders who need operational infrastructure, not just advice
Organizations ready to invest in the machine behind the vision
Advisory Session
Most founders don't need more information — they need someone who has operated at scale to look at their specific situation, tell them what they're actually dealing with, and hand them a written prescription for what to do next. That's this.
What you walk away with
A written recommendation report — not a framework, not a slide deck. A clear diagnosis of what's actually happening in your business and a concrete, prioritized set of next steps you can act on immediately.
A real working session with two senior operators who come prepared. We review your application in advance, ask hard questions, challenge your assumptions, and tell you what we actually see — including things that may be uncomfortable to hear.
Between us, we have managed P&L responsibility for $40M+ business units, led organizational change across $56B enterprises, and owned cross-functional teams in aerospace, manufacturing, and technology. We don't coach — we operate.
How it works
Tell us about your business, your current challenge, and what success looks like 90 days from now. We review every application personally and will confirm your session within 48 hours.
We review your application in advance and come to the session with context, questions, and an initial frame. You should expect us to have already formed a point of view before we start.
Not a discovery call. Not a rapport-building exercise. A real working session where we go deep on your specific situation, challenge your assumptions, and tell you what we actually think.
Within five business days, you receive a clear written document: a diagnosis of the root cause, a prioritized set of recommendations, and the tradeoffs you need to understand before acting.
Ready?
Submit your application and we will be in touch within 48 hours to confirm your session.
Project Engagement
Some problems need more than a recommendation. They need someone to get in the weeds with you — to embed with your team, work through the complexity, and build the solution alongside you. Project engagements are for exactly that.
Every project is scoped to a specific problem with defined deliverables, clear milestones, and a fixed duration. You know what you're getting before we start.
When this is the right fit
Project engagements work best when the problem is clear but the solution requires operational expertise and dedicated bandwidth to execute. Common examples:
Vendor fragmentation, lead time problems, single points of failure. We diagnose, redesign, and help you execute the transition.
Growing faster than your org chart can support. We help you build the right structure before the wrong one calcifies.
Sales, product, and engineering working in silos. We identify the breakdown points and build the connective tissue.
Metrics, reporting, accountability systems. We help you build the operational backbone your next stage of growth requires.
Scoping a critical leadership hire, running a structured process, and building a 90-day onboarding plan that actually works.
New market, new product, new channel. We help you make sure the operations can support what you're about to sell.
How we work
We start with a conversation to understand the problem, your timeline, and what a successful outcome looks like. This is where we establish whether a project engagement is the right structure or whether a different model serves you better.
We deliver a written scope of work with defined deliverables, milestones, timeline, and investment. No ambiguity about what's included and what isn't. You approve before we start.
We get in the weeds. That means attending relevant meetings, working directly with your team, and building solutions alongside you — not handing you a deck and wishing you luck.
Regular check-ins to review progress, surface blockers, and adjust the approach if the situation requires it. We flag problems early rather than delivering surprises at the end.
Every project ends with a clear written deliverable and documentation your team can use after we're gone. We build to transfer — not to create dependency on us.
Fractional COO & Ongoing Advisory
A full-time COO at a growth-stage company costs $200K–$350K in salary alone — before equity, benefits, and the time it takes to find and onboard the right person. A fractional COO gives you executive-level operational leadership embedded in your business at a fraction of that cost, without the permanent overhead.
This is not a monthly check-in. This is an ongoing operational partnership — attending key meetings, holding leadership accountability, and helping you build the infrastructure your next stage requires.
The honest comparison
Most growth-stage founders are choosing between a few options. Here's how they actually stack up.
What's included
We attend your key leadership meetings, act as a decision-making partner, and hold accountability across your organization — not as an outside advisor watching from a distance.
We operate at the level the problem requires. Some weeks that's a board-level strategic conversation. Others it's getting in the weeds on a specific process breakdown.
We help you build the systems, processes, and team structures your next stage requires — before the absence of them becomes a crisis.
We work directly with your existing leaders to close skill gaps, improve cross-functional communication, and increase their ability to operate without the founder in the room.
Scoping key roles, evaluating candidates, and building onboarding frameworks for leadership hires that actually set people up to succeed.
We are explicit from day one that our goal is to make ourselves unnecessary. Every system we build, every framework we introduce — it's designed to run without us.
We don't have a standard retainer tier sheet. Engagements are scoped based on depth of involvement, hours per month, and duration. Most retainers are structured monthly with a minimum three-month commitment.
In technical organizations, the path to management is almost always the same: someone does exceptional individual contributor work, gets promoted, and is handed a team with no real preparation for what leading people actually requires. The result is predictable — brilliant technical minds who struggle to communicate, motivate, and build the psychological safety their teams need to do their best work.
This workshop changes that. In one full day, we give your engineering leaders the practical tools, honest frameworks, and hands-on practice to lead with confidence — not just competence.
What we cover
The curriculum is built on the Lead Out Loud Leadership Essentials framework — developed by Sean Genovese with nearly 14 years leading technical teams at Boeing and teaching engineering management at CSUN.
What it actually means to lead — and the big lie most engineers are told about it
An introduction to the Lead Out Loud model and how it reframes what effective leadership looks like in technical environments.
How a mismatched tone undermines even the best message — and how to deliver with intention and clarity.
Hands-on exercises where participants practice delivering difficult messages with the right tone. Failure is the point.
How non-verbal communication changes the meaning of your words — and how to use it intentionally
Practical instruction on how physical presence amplifies or undermines the message you're trying to send.
A structured exercise in giving difficult feedback — starting from what not to do so participants understand where the failure points are.
Role-play with live feedback from the facilitator and cohort. A safe environment to fail before your team sees you try.
Understanding what actually drives people — and how to lead a high-performing team in the modern workplace
What decades of organizational psychology tells us about what drives performance — and how it has changed in the digital age.
Practical frameworks for energizing a team without relying on command-and-control tactics that erode trust over time.
A full-group simulation integrating all three modules — tone, presence, and motivation — in a real leadership scenario.
Why it works
The Lead Out Loud methodology draws from three unconventional sources — and that's exactly why it works for engineers who have tuned out every generic leadership training they've ever attended.
Improv creates a safe environment for messy learning — trying things without consequence. Engineers are trained to avoid failure. This gives them permission to fail fast, learn immediately, and build confidence without real-world stakes.
Engineers already speak Agile. We use that fluency to introduce leadership concepts in a framework they trust — breaking complex skills into sprints, building iteratively, and treating every exercise as a testable hypothesis.
Groups of 5–6 participants mean everyone is active and accountable. No hiding in a conference room. The cohort format creates peer accountability and the kind of candid feedback you only get in a small group.
Sean spent nearly 14 years at Boeing leading technical teams and now teaches engineering management at CSUN. He speaks the language. This is not a repurposed corporate training — it was designed specifically for how engineers think and learn.
The facilitator
Sean Genovese spent nearly 14 years at Boeing leading large-scale organizational change across $56B business units — managing cross-functional teams in manufacturing, supply chain, engineering, and IT. He now runs SG Enterprises, teaches engineering management at CSUN, and has spent years developing the Lead Out Loud methodology specifically for technical professionals navigating the IC-to-manager transition.
He doesn't teach leadership theory. He teaches what actually worked — and what didn't — in the technical environments where the stakes were real.
Creator of the Lead Out Loud framework and Leadership Essentials program. Engineering management professor at CSUN. Former Boeing organizational change leader.
Ready to invest in your team?
We'll confirm availability, discuss your team's specific context, and schedule a date that works.