It was 20-odd years ago when the lovely bubble of corporate life burst. I was on a plane travelling across the globe with my newborn baby, working crazy hours with little to no flexibility and lack of real purpose.

I yearned for freedom of choice, more control, meaning and flexibility over my life. Top talent is becoming disillusioned with corporate life for the same reasons. Thankfully there is a career option that offers all of those things.Many entrepreneurial and growing businesses neither need nor can afford full-time C-suite executives. They find themselves either lacking the essential support needed to scale or they overcommit to resources they don’t truly need.

In the case of large corporates, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find the skills and knowledge required to fulfil all the obligations of a functional C-suite with a fixed group of individuals. The proliferation of full-time C-suite roles and the addition of more and more responsibilities to each is our attempt to keep up, but it may not be sustainable.

C-Suite as service

Thankfully, there is a solution: ‘C-suite as service’. Rather than owning your C-suite in the sense of ‘employing’ them, you access them when needed.

This is part of the ‘the C-suite access economy’, which allows organisations to get access to the financial, emotional and collective intelligence at the CFO level by moving their positions from the ‘pay-roll’ to an ‘access-role’. It is a practical, alternative vision of the future of work for senior finance executives that is gaining significant interest and is being adopted by businesses globally.

How does this work in practice?

Rather than being employed by one company, each CFO will have a portfolio of SME clients (usually between three and 10), each of which they work with permanently but on a flexible, fractional basis.

A typical relationship might be a day a week, but it can range from a day a month to three or four days per week, depending on the complexity and size of the business. The fractional CFOs will build capacity into their portfolios so they can dial time up and down as needed by their clients.

Growing SMEs, typically with revenues between £2m to £100m, can get access to the exact level of support they need, when they need it. The C-suite professional walks right beside the business owner every step of the way. They guide, they challenge (appropriately) and pick them up when they’ve suffered setbacks.

Larger corporates with skill shortages can access the support they need in a way that complements rather than threatens their team. 

C-suite professionals might not be full-time or full-cost, but are highly likely to be fully committed. The fact these C-suite professionals are self-employed and independent is the very reason why these relationships can work so well. These individuals are there because they want to be and are delivering value, and if they aren’t they should go. That’s the beauty of the model – it’s easy in and easy out.

How to transition into the portfolio world

The training and experience from the corporate world does provide the foundations and entry requirements to build a portfolio of SME clients, but it is just the starting point.

Budding access economy professionals need to consider the move as a career change, requiring an investment of time and money. The tricky part is getting started, which can be difficult and time-consuming. You need a financial runway, support from your nearest and dearest, full commitment (turning off the job ads), and sales and marketing skills.

Future-proofing your portfolio career

Once the clients are secured, you then have the challenge of keeping them. Historically, relationships in the access economy are deemed as ‘temporary’ and ‘uncaring’. Diversifying your client base becomes critical to mitigate the risk of income loss. Carefully choosing clients from different industries, sizes, cultures and lifecycle stages adds further resilience to your portfolio.

My research reveals that building ‘psychological ownership’ into client engagements by developing four critical components – control, psychological safety, intimacy and self-investment – enables these relationships to last without an employment contract.

Whether you’re considering a shift to this way of working or looking to enhance your current portfolio, the What does it take to build a thriving future-proofed portfolio career? webinar from ICAEW will provide invaluable insights to help you thrive in the growing C-suite access economy. Freedom in work is the future of work.

The webinar is on 3 September this year, is free for ICAEW members and will cost £15+VAT for non-members.

Sara Daw is Co-Founder and Group CEO of The CFO Centre and The Liberti Group, a provider of part-time portfolio professionals, and author of Strategy and Leadership as Service: How the Access Economy Meets the C-Suite, published by Routledge.