Your team is doing research. Nobody's making sure it's influencing the roadmap.
Hiring a full-time Research Lead is a big commitment. But running a product or service team without senior research leadership is a bigger risk.
Fractional Research Lead gives you the strategic oversight, stakeholder alignment, and hands-on guidance your team needs without the overhead of a full-time hire.
Who this is for
Product or service teams growing fast who need research to keep pace with the roadmap. Teams with researchers on staff but no senior leadership connecting their work to product and business decisions. Organizations that lost a research lead and aren't ready to backfill. And teams that want to build a practice that actually sticks, not one that resets every time someone new joins.
How it works
I embed with your team on a part-time basis, typically one to two days per week, and act as your senior research lead for as long as the engagement runs. That means setting research direction, mentoring your researchers, connecting findings to roadmap decisions, and making sure the right people in your organization are hearing what the research is telling them. I'm not just a consultant who shows up, delivers a report, and disappears. I'm part of the team for the duration.
What you get
Your team makes better decisions faster, research starts shaping the roadmap instead of just informing it, and you build a practice that outlasts the engagement.
About the Research Lead engagement
How many hours per week does this engagement require?
Typically one to two days per week, though we'll scope the right level of involvement based on your team's size, pace, and what you need. Some teams need more at the start and less over time as things stabilize.
How is this different from hiring a full-time research lead?
You get the same strategic oversight and hands-on leadership without the salary, benefits, recruiting time, and long-term commitment. It's the right fit for teams that need senior experience now but aren't ready to make a permanent hire.
How long do engagements typically run?
Most Research Lead engagements run three to six months with the option to extend. Some clients have kept the engagement running for over a year. There's no minimum. We can scope what makes sense for your situation. I'm based in Atlanta and work with teams remotely and on-site across the US.
What does success look like?
Decisions start getting made with research in the room, not after the fact. Your team builds stronger study designs, sharper synthesis, and clearer recommendations. And the practice holds after the engagement ends. I track progress against those goals throughout.