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Every founder wants top-tier talent. But when your company is young, two obstacles loom. The first one is that no one knows you. The second one is that, likely, you cant afford a full-time senior hire. The irony is that this is when you most need experienced leadership, because without it, you risk mistakes that cost more than the salary you were aiming to save. Why startups should consider senior leaders part time Bringing in a seasoned executive on a fractional basis is often a better answer than stretching for a junior full-time hire. A senior leader working part time gives you sharper decision-making, clearer priorities, and fewer detours. You get the benefit of years of experience without locking yourself into a payroll commitment you cant sustain. For the right scope of work, five hours a week from someone who has scaled before is worth more than 50 hours from someone learning on the job. Especially lately, many senior professionals are open to this model. Some want flexibility for family or side projects. Others value variety and like to keep a portfolio of roles. And in a market still shaped by layoffs, part-time income streams feel safer than a single employer. Hence, this arrangement makes sense for both sides, as long as expectations are set early and respected. How to hire part-time senior talent The first step is clarity. A vague job description with slogans will not suffice to attract someone experienced. Spell out the outcomes you expect. Instead of help us drive growth, say design and oversee a three-month plan to test five paid acquisition channels. Define how decisions will be made, the reporting line, and what success looks like. This will help them feel the role as something achievable in the time you are offering. Next, design the role to be respectful of their level. Senior operators will not commit to open-ended advisory calls or endless Slack pings. Set specific projects with clear deliverables, and show them you have thought about how their time will be used and that you understand the value they bring. The more tangible you can make the assignment, the easier it is for them to picture success. Finally, make it easy to say yes. Offer a paid pilot so both sides can test the fit. Be transparent about budget and timelines. Pay on time, and share how their work will be applied. And, of course, acknowledge their contribution. These details signal professionalism, and when you are still unknown, this matters more than perks. How to work with fractional leaders once you have them Hiring is only the beginning. To get value from a fractional leader, you need to create an environment where they can contribute without friction. As Jim Collins once observed, Great people need great things to do, or they will take their creative energies elsewhere. Even part-time, seasoned professionals will disengage if the setup is chaotic or the work is poorly defined. That means giving them access to the information they need, assigning a clear decision-maker they can work with, and sticking to a predictable cadence of check-ins. Chaos burns trust quickly, even if the hours are limited. To avoid this, set super clear expectations on both sides. They should know how you prioritize, how experiments differ from commitments, and who owns which decisions. You should know how they prefer to communicate and how they measure success. When the rhythm is established, their time multiplies the impact of your whole team, and the fractional leader can quickly raise the standard of execution and help you move faster. The bottom line For an early-stage company, every hire carries risk. But trying to fill a senior role full time before you can afford it is often the bigger risk. A fractional leader can give you the judgment and experience you need to avoid expensive mistakes, while keeping your company nimble. Start clear, keep the scope focused, and follow through on your commitments. Do that, and you will find senior professionals willing to bet on you, long before the market knows your name.
Category:
E-Commerce
According to a new NBC poll of 2,970 adults ages 18 to 29, Gen Z men and women are at oddsnot just about politics but also on how theyre viewed at work and what it means to be successful. For starters, men approve of Trump’s job performance at a far higher rate than women. A hefty 74% of women disapprove of the job Trump is doing, while only 53% of men in the same age bracket do. The genders were the most divided on Trump’s immigration policies, as 45% of men said they approve, while only 21% of women said the same. They also have different takes on gender and workplace culture. When asked if gender matters when it comes to getting ahead at work, more than two-thirds of men (69%) said gender doesn’t make a difference. Only about half of women (51%) felt similarly, and 44% of women said it helps to be a man. Only 27% of men answered the same way. One thing that Gen Zers were thought to be less divided on is their staggering rates of anxiety. Previous studies have shown that Gen Z struggles with anxietyabout work, finances, and the economy. However, according to the new poll, Gen Z women are far more anxious than men. While one-third (33%) of women said they feel anxious about the future almost all of the time, only 19% of men said they feel anxious “almost all of the time.” And when it comes to ideas about their plans for their future, as well as their views on what makes a successful life, Gen Z men and women are vastly different when examined through a political lens. Overall, they had the same top three answers on what defines success: “having a job or career you find fulfilling,” “having enough money to do the things you want to do,” and “having enough money to do the things you want to do.”However, when it came to women who voted for Harris versus men who voted for Trump, the answers were strikingly different. While the male Trump voters valued having children as the most important for personal success, the female Harris voters ranked it as the second-least important out of 13 choices, showing perhaps the starkest divide in the entire poll.
Category:
E-Commerce
A federal appeals court on Monday revived a Trader Joe’s lawsuit accusing a fledgling employee union of trademark infringement for selling t-shirts, buttons, mugs and reusable tote bags featuring the grocery chain’s distinctive red typeface and logo. In a 3-0 decision, The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Pasadena, California said a trial judge was too quick to dismiss the lawsuit against Trader Joe’s United, which said it was created in 2022 and has four local chapters. Circuit Judge Gabriel Sanchez said the strength of the Trader Joe’s name, the chain’s own sale of tote bags, and the “strikingly similar” marks featuring the same red color, similar fonts and concentric circles could confuse consumers. “This is not one of the rare trademark infringement cases in which there is no plausible likelihood that a reasonably prudent consumer would be confused,” Sanchez wrote. Monday’s decision reversed a January 2024 ruling by U.S. District Judge Hernan Vera in Los Angeles, and returned the case to him. Vera called the union’s use of the Trader Joe’s mark fair use, and accused Trader Joe’s of trying to “weaponize the legal system” by suing to gain advantage in a labor dispute. Trader Joe’s disagreed, telling the appeals court that federal labor law protects many important union rights including advocacy, organizing and striking, but “selling branded goods in commerce is not one of them.” The union countered that no reasonable consumer would be confused by its tote bag, the only product sold by both parties. According to court papers, the Trader Joe’s bag featured wine, fruit, cheese and a cutting board. The union bag included a fist holding a box cutter, and the word “union.” Trader Joe’s is based in Monrovia, California, and has about 600 stores. Lawyers for the union did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Trader Joe’s and its lawyers did not immediately respond to similar requests. The case is Trader Joe’s Co v Trader Joe’s United, 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, No. 24-720. Jonathan Stempel, Reuters
Category:
E-Commerce
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