Fractional COO/Executives
For mid-market organizations that need seasoned executive leadership without a full-time hire.
You gain an operating rhythm that scales without heroics, then a clean handoff when the engagement ends.
Services
Six ways we serve leaders.
Pilot's senior partners and fractional executives bring the right operating experience to each challenge, then embed deeply, execute with discipline, and transfer ownership completely.
How We Work With You
Six services of equal standing. Choose the one that fits the challenge in front of you.
Pilot Sea Trials
For organizations that want to see how Pilot works before any longer commitment.
One visible problem or opportunity addressed, with a measured result at day 90 and no obligation to continue.
Every Sea Trial has a fixed price for the 90 days, set in writing before we start, based on the size of your company and the scope of the work. See the full pricing details.
Leadership Development
For leaders ready to sharpen their execution, presence, and ability to develop their own teams.
Leaders who run their organizations with confidence and grow the people around them.
Pilot Leadership Circle
For CEOs and senior leaders who want trusted peers from outside their own company.
Better decisions, made with confidential, real-world perspective from non-competing leaders.
Keynote Speaking
For event organizers who want practical executive insight on stage, not theory.
Audiences leave with actions they can apply immediately to culture, teams, and turnarounds.
Fractional COO Certification Program
For experienced professionals building their own fractional operating practice.
The Pilot Way™ methodology, tools, frameworks, and a credential to launch your practice.
Trusted Partner
The Extended Bench.
Six senior operators lead Pilot's work in heavy and critical industry. When growth or recovery calls for a seat outside that core, such as a CFO, a sales or marketing leader, a technology leader or an HR leader, Andrew brings in the right person from our Trusted Partner, the 5FT View Fractional Expert Collective: 60+ credentialed fractional executives across every function and industry. Andrew is a Verified Genuine Fractional member, and you keep one relationship and one accountable point of contact.
Meet the Extended BenchAI Chief of Staff for the CEO's Office
The CEOs we work with spend hours each week on prep, follow-up and paperwork that never needed them. We design an AI staff around your week, have it built in your own accounts, and run it with you for 90 days. Nothing goes out without your OK.
See the AI Chief of Staff Sea TrialProfit Hawk: Sales and Operations Planning
A model of your whole company from your own data. The most profitable plan you could run, beside what you actually did. The price of every constraint. A plan your leadership team adopts. Ninety days, fixed price.
See Profit HawkCould your company run without you for three weeks?
Twenty questions, five minutes, free. A straight read on how much of the business still runs through you.
Take the Five-Minute Leader AssessmentFractional COO Engagement
What a Fractional COO engagement costs.
| Engagement | Monthly fee |
|---|---|
| Fractional COO engagement | Every Sea Trial has a fixed price for the 90 days, set in writing before we start, based on the size of your company and the scope of the work. |
Every Sea Trial has a fixed price for the 90 days, set in writing before we start, based on the size of your company and the scope of the work. Twelve to eighteen months. See the full pricing details.
What you should ask us before you let anyone into your plant.
How often will you actually be here?
The engagement commits to outcomes and to an operating cadence rather than to a day count. In practice that is weekly on site at the start, settling as your team takes the cadence over. If we can get you there in fewer days, that is our problem to solve rather than your saving to capture, and it is the reason we do not bill by the day.
Who is physically in my plant?
Normally Andrew Bielat leads engagements, unless it is more effective or more timely for the client to have one of our Senior Partners lead. All work is supported and ensured by the Senior Partners, and whoever carries part of the work is named in the engagement letter before it starts, not introduced later.
What if we need a CFO or another leader you don't cover?
Andrew brings in a verified fractional executive from our Trusted Partner, the 5FT View Fractional Expert Collective. No second search, and no second relationship to manage.
What safety credentials do you carry?
Pilot senior partner James Vera led the safest startup on record at a major chemical demilitarization facility and holds VPP Star status at two sites. Andrew Bielat formed and led the Independent Safety Review Group at a commercial nuclear plant, reporting to the Chief Nuclear Officer, and has led more than fifty root cause and corrective action projects across commercial nuclear power and the chemical demilitarization program. Andrew also trained thousands of employees on human error prevention throughout the commercial US and Canadian nuclear industry.
What happens at the end?
Twelve to eighteen months with an end date written into the agreement. Sixty days notice either direction, and a documented handover to your team. The operating system stays with you. That is the point of it.
Confidentiality, conflicts and insurance
What we see inside your company stays inside it. We will sign your NDA. If you do not have one, we will provide ours. We do not run two engagements at the same time in directly competing operations. A certificate of insurance naming your company goes to your risk manager before the first site visit.