Fractional COO / Owner’s Representative – Vendor, Commercial and Delivery Oversight

I am looking for an experienced fractional COO, owner’s representative or senior commercial operator to independently review several active projects and the external providers working on them. This is not a generic VA, business coach or administrative project-management role. I need someone who can assess whether consultants, agencies, suppliers and contractors are genuinely competent, verify what they are reporting, challenge weak assumptions and identify problems before they become expensive. The projects span a mixture of: * Product-based businesses * Property and investment activity * New service-based ventures * Digital strategy, branding, content and growth engagements * External suppliers, agencies, analysts and contractors Further details will be provided privately to shortlisted candidates. Recent issues have included: * Providers overstating progress or capability * Insufficient contingency planning * Important work being completed sequentially when parallel options were needed * Commercial projections changing materially without a clear explanation * Errors or unsupported assumptions in professional reports * Expensive strategy work requiring independent assessment of its practical value, deliverability and likely commercial impact * Missed deadlines and appointments * Broad disclaimers being used instead of taking responsibility for work within the provider’s actual scope I need an independent person working on my side whose default questions are: * What evidence supports this claim? * What has actually been completed? * Have the underlying assumptions changed? * Are the revised projections internally consistent and commercially credible? * Why does the current position differ from the original expectation? * What risks, dependencies or missing information are being overlooked? * Is there a viable backup route? * Is this provider genuinely adding value? * Should they be retained, challenged, restricted, renegotiated with or replaced? Responsibilities: * Review and vet existing consultants, agencies, suppliers, analysts and contractors * Assess whether their claimed expertise is relevant and supported by their actual work * Review budgets, forecasts, pricing assumptions, quotations and commercial models * Examine material changes between earlier and revised projections * Identify calculation errors, unsupported assumptions, omissions and inconsistencies * Assess whether projected outcomes are commercially realistic rather than merely theoretically possible * Review agency strategies and determine whether the proposed work is sufficiently specific, actionable and commercially justified * Evaluate whether branding, content, marketing and growth providers are delivering useful strategy rather than polished but generic documents * Check whether deliverables match the agreed scope, cost and intended outcome * Challenge vague updates and request evidence of genuine progress * Review deadlines, dependencies, risks, decisions and unresolved actions * Identify single points of failure and recommend appropriate contingency options * Review contractor and supplier scopes for inflated, missing or unnecessary work * Coordinate specialist advice where legal, tax, technical or regulatory verification is genuinely required * Recommend whether existing providers should be retained, challenged, renegotiated with or replaced * Help establish stronger systems for approvals, reporting, evidence and accountability Reporting: For each review or intervention, I want a concise owner-level assessment covering: * What is genuinely on track * What is delayed or at risk * Which claims have not been evidenced * Which calculations or assumptions require challenge * Where scope, cost or expected value is unclear * Which decisions require my attention * Which providers are performing well * Which providers may need to be challenged, renegotiated with or replaced I do not want lengthy reports that simply repeat what other providers have said. I want clear conclusions, supporting evidence and recommended actions. Essential experience: * Senior operational, commercial, investment or owner-side oversight experience * Strong numerical and commercial literacy * Experience reviewing budgets, forecasts, proposals and changing commercial assumptions * Experience managing and challenging third-party professionals * Ability to distinguish genuine progress from polished reporting * Comfortable questioning senior consultants and requesting evidence * Strong judgement around value for money * Able to assess both quantitative work and strategic or creative agency output * Direct, concise and commercially minded communication Experience in some of the following would be useful: * Product development and supply chains * Procurement and overseas suppliers * Property or investment projects * Refurbishment and contractor management * Hospitality or service-based ventures * Branding, content, marketing and digital agencies * Business launches and operational scaling No single candidate is expected to be a technical expert in every area. The key requirement is the ability to identify weak work, interrogate evidence, recognise when specialist input is necessary and prevent providers from hiding behind jargon or excessive disclaimers. What I do not want: * Generic VAs * Junior project coordinators * Motivational business coaches * Candidates who simply summarise documents * People who automatically accept provider updates * Polished presentations without firm conclusions * Someone who refers every issue to another professional without first analysing it * Someone unwilling to challenge underperformance or deliver uncomfortable findings Initial paid trial: The engagement will begin with a fixed-price paid review exercise. You may be given anonymised examples of: * A commercial forecast that has been materially revised * A supplier or project-progress update * An investment analysis * An agency strategy or proposal * Communications from consultants, contractors or service providers You will be asked to identify: * Errors or inconsistencies * Unsupported claims * Missing evidence * Changes in assumptions * Commercial and delivery risks * Weaknesses in scope or accountability * Whether the proposed work appears worth its cost * Questions that should be raised * Recommended actions * Whether the providers involved appear competent and worth retaining Candidates who perform well may be retained for ongoing ad hoc support. Engagement: * The engagement will begin with a fixed-price paid trial * Successful candidates may be retained for ongoing ad hoc support when a provider, proposal, forecast, quotation or major decision requires independent review * This is not expected to involve regular weekly hours * The likely workload will usually be around **1–3 hours per month** * Additional work may occasionally be agreed for significant projects or urgent issues * There is no guaranteed minimum number of hours * Any expansion of the role will be agreed separately based on performance and business need Use of AI: AI tools may be used to assist with research, organisation, transcription, formatting or proofreading. However, they must not replace the candidate’s own analysis, commercial judgement or verification. All conclusions, calculations, recommendations and assessments must be personally reviewed and owned by the freelancer. I do not want generic AI-generated summaries, unverified claims, fabricated sources or documents that simply repackage information I have already provided. Any material use of AI in producing a deliverable should be disclosed. The freelancer remains fully responsible for checking the accuracy of the work and must be able to explain and defend every conclusion in their own words. The value of this role is independent human judgement. I already have access to AI tools myself, so I am not hiring someone merely to feed documents into AI and return the output I am looking for someone sceptical, commercially sharp and willing to deliver uncomfortable conclusions when the evidence supports them. Please begin your proposal with “Evidence before assurance” so I know you have read the full brief.