Builds a hiring process that holds up.
Defines the roles before they are posted, sets a consistent interview loop, and gets offers out the door with the right paperwork. Hiring stops depending on whoever happens to be free that week.
Nacho ordinary people leadership
People leadership without the CHRO salary
Nacho matches growing businesses with vetted, 100% US-based Fractional HR leaders who own hiring, pay, policy, and performance as your Head of People, starting at $125/hr.
Free 30-minute call. Every match backed by the Nacho re-match guarantee.
The short answer
What is Fractional HR?
Fractional HR means an experienced HR leader, usually titled Head of People or Fractional CHRO, who runs your people function part-time, usually 1 to 3 days a week. They own hiring, compensation, policy, performance, and employee relations, exactly like a full-time HR leader. Through Nacho, Fractional HR starts at $125 an hour.
The word "fractional" describes the schedule, not the seniority. A Fractional HR leader is not an HR assistant and not a recruiter. It is a career people leader who has already built the function somewhere else, taking on your company as one of a small number of clients.
HR is the function most small businesses leave with the founder the longest. Hiring, pay, and every difficult conversation route through one person who never trained for it, until a resignation or a dispute makes the gap obvious. Fractional HR closes that gap without a full-time executive salary on payroll.
It helps to see the people roles as a stack. A PEO or payroll provider pays people and administers benefits. An HR coordinator or generalist handles the day-to-day paperwork and questions. An HR consultant delivers a defined project and leaves. A Head of People or CHRO decides how the company hires, pays, and manages, and owns the outcome. Fractional HR puts that top layer in place first.
- Seniority
- Head of People or CHRO-level experience
- Schedule
- Usually 1 to 3 days a week
- Reports to
- You, the founder or CEO
- Owns
- Hiring, pay, policy, performance, and employee relations
- Cost through Nacho
- From $125/hr from one monthly Talent Budget
- Based in
- The United States, 100% of the time
The job itself
What does a Fractional HR leader actually do?
A Fractional HR leader builds your hiring process, sets compensation and leveling, writes the policies and handbook, runs performance reviews, coaches managers through hard conversations, and owns retention. The work is deciding how you treat people, not filing their paperwork.
Sets compensation and leveling.
Creates a clear structure for titles, pay bands, and raises so you can answer "why do they make more than me" with a framework instead of a shrug.
Writes the policies and the handbook.
Puts the employee handbook, leave policies, and core practices in writing, keeps them current as you grow into new states, and knows when a question needs an employment attorney.
Runs performance and reviews.
Sets up goals, check-ins, and a review cycle your managers will actually use, so feedback happens on a schedule rather than only when something has already gone wrong.
Handles the hard conversations.
Coaches managers through underperformance, conflict, and terminations, documents them properly, and takes the employee relations load off the founder.
Owns retention and culture.
Works out why good people leave, fixes onboarding, chooses the benefits and HR tools, and manages the PEO or payroll vendor so the people side of the business has one owner.
What a Fractional Head of People does not do is run payroll or give legal advice. A PEO or payroll provider handles the first. An employment attorney handles the second. Your Fractional HR leader decides what those partners should be doing and makes sure they do it.
Timing
When should you hire Fractional HR?
Hire Fractional HR when people decisions are landing on the founder faster than they can be made well. The usual trigger is a growing team where hiring is speeding up, pay has drifted, managers are new, or a difficult situation has already been handled badly once.
Signs you are ready
- The founder is still the person every employee comes to with a people problem.
- You are hiring faster than you can keep interviews, offers, and onboarding consistent.
- Pay was set one negotiation at a time and nobody can explain the differences.
- You have no handbook, or the one you have was written three states and twenty people ago.
- Good people are leaving and you only find out why in the exit conversation.
- Your managers were promoted for doing the work well, and nobody taught them to manage.
When it is the wrong hire
- You need payroll run and benefits administered. A PEO or payroll provider handles that for less.
- You have a live legal dispute. That is a job for an employment attorney first.
- You have three people and no hiring planned. The structure would outweigh the team.
- You want someone to post jobs and schedule interviews. That is recruiting coordination, not HR leadership.
- You are not going to change how you hire, pay, or manage based on what you learn.
We would rather tell you on the discovery call that a PEO covers what you need than sell you a leader you will not use. If the real gap is capacity, an Executive Assistant or Specialist solves it for less.
Real numbers
What does Fractional HR cost?
Fractional HR through Nacho starts at $125 an hour. There is no placement fee and no separate retainer. Hours draw from one monthly Talent Budget with a $1,000 monthly minimum, so at the starting rate about $2,000 a month buys roughly 16 hours and about $8,000 a month buys roughly 2 days a week.
People work comes in waves. A steady month is policy upkeep, a few manager questions, and one hard conversation. A month with a hiring push, a review cycle, or a restructure in it is several times that. The hourly model means you pay for the month you actually had.
The comparison most owners never run is the loaded cost of the full-time alternative. A salary is not the price of an employee. Payroll taxes, benefits, insurance, software, and equipment commonly add 25% to 35% on top of it, and a retained search adds 20% to 25% of the first-year salary in year one alone.
| What you are comparing | Fractional HR through Nacho | Full-time Head of People |
|---|---|---|
| Rate | From $125/hr, published up front | $150,000 to $250,000 base salary, negotiated |
| Typical schedule | 1 to 3 days a week | 5 days a week |
| Payroll taxes and benefits | None. They are not your employee. | Commonly adds 25% to 35% on top of salary |
| Recruiting cost | None | 20% to 25% of first-year salary for a retained search |
| Equity | None | Often expected at this level |
| Time to first day | About a week from the discovery call | 2 to 4 months to search, close, and start |
| Ramp-up | Arrives having run the function before | 30 to 90 days before they truly own it |
| Commitment | 3-month initial term, then month to month | At-will in name, expensive in practice |
| If the fit is wrong | Free re-match under the Nacho Guarantee | Severance, a second search, and lost quarters |
| Illustrative annual cost | About $96,000 at 2 days a week | About $260,000 loaded on a $200,000 salary |
Salary and search-fee ranges above are broad US market ranges for the role and vary widely by industry, region, and company stage. Treat them as a planning starting point, not a quote. The Nacho column is our published starting rate.
What the $125 starting rate actually buys
- $1,000 a month is about 8 hours: a policy and handbook owner, plus a monthly check-in for manager questions.
- $2,000 a month is about 16 hours: the above, plus real work on a hiring process, a pay structure, or a review cycle.
- $8,000 a month is about 64 hours, roughly 2 days a week: full ownership of the people function through a hiring push, a restructure, or rapid growth.
Unused budget above the $1,000 minimum rolls over, up to $200 a month. Everything bills as one flat monthly Talent Budget, and if you also need an Executive Assistant from $40/hr or a Specialist from $65/hr, they draw from the same budget. The only other fee is the $300 Delegation Strategy Plan, which comes before your first match. See how pricing works.
The process
How hiring a Fractional Head of People through Nacho works
You book a free 30-minute discovery call, we build a $300 Delegation Strategy Plan, and we introduce you to 1 to 3 hand-picked Fractional HR leaders from our vetted, 100% US-based network. Most clients meet their first match within about a week.
-
Book a free discovery call.
Thirty minutes, no obligation. Tell us where the people side of the business is breaking. We will tell you honestly whether you need a Fractional HR leader, or whether a PEO or a Specialist solves it first.
-
We build your Delegation Strategy Plan.
For $300 we scope the engagement in writing: what your Fractional Head of People owns, how many hours a month that takes, what the first 90 days should produce, and how you will know it worked.
-
You meet your shortlist.
We hand-pick 1 to 3 Fractional HR leaders from our vetted, 100% US-based network and send you their backgrounds. You interview them. Nobody starts until you say yes to a specific person.
-
We handle the paperwork.
Contracts, payments, and onboarding run through Nacho. Your Fractional Head of People starts on an agreed monthly rhythm and reports to you, not to us.
-
You scale it up or down.
A 3-month initial term gives the work time to land, then it is month to month. Add hours during a hiring push or a review cycle, pull back when things are steady, and if the match is not right we re-match you free under the Nacho Guarantee.
Need a different kind of leader?
- Fractional CFOForecasting, cash, and pricing
- Fractional COOOperations, process, and delivery
- Fractional CMOMarketing strategy, budget, and demand
Every role comes from the same network under the same Talent Budget. Compare every Fractional Executive role.
Frequently asked questions
Fractional HR questions, answered
What is Fractional HR?
Fractional HR means bringing in an experienced HR leader, often titled Head of People or Fractional CHRO, part-time, usually 1 to 3 days a week. They own hiring, compensation, policy, performance, and employee relations the way a full-time HR leader would, but you pay only for the time you use.
What is the difference between Fractional HR and an HR consultant?
An HR consultant is usually hired for a defined project, like a handbook or a compensation study, and leaves when the deliverable is done. A Fractional HR leader owns the function on an ongoing basis: they sit in the leadership conversation, make the calls, and are still there when the policy meets a real situation.
What is the difference between Fractional HR and a PEO?
A PEO handles HR administration: payroll, benefits enrollment, and much of the paperwork, often by becoming the employer of record for your team. It does not set your people strategy. A Fractional HR leader decides how you hire, pay, and manage, and often chooses and manages the PEO. Many companies use both.
What is a Fractional CHRO, and how is it different from a Fractional HR Director?
The titles describe scope more than a fixed job. A Fractional CHRO or Head of People usually works at the leadership level on strategy, structure, and culture. A Fractional HR Director often leans more toward running day-to-day HR operations. We scope the role you actually need in your Delegation Strategy Plan before anyone is matched.
How much does Fractional HR cost?
Through Nacho, a Fractional HR leader starts at $125/hr with no placement fee and no separate retainer. Hours draw from one monthly Talent Budget with a $1,000 monthly minimum, so at the starting rate roughly $2,000 a month buys about 16 hours and roughly $8,000 a month buys about 2 days a week. A $300 Delegation Strategy Plan is the only other fee, and it comes before your first match.
How many hours a month does a Fractional HR leader work?
It depends on headcount and how much is changing. A steady engagement often runs 16 to 40 hours a month for policy upkeep, manager coaching, and employee relations, then rises during a hiring push, a review cycle, a restructure, or an expansion into new states.
What do fractional HR services include?
Through Nacho, a Fractional HR leader can own hiring process design, compensation and leveling, the employee handbook and policies, performance reviews, manager coaching, employee relations, onboarding, benefits and HR tool selection, and the relationship with your PEO or payroll provider. Your Delegation Strategy Plan sets which of those come first.
When should a small business hire Fractional HR?
The common trigger is when people questions start landing on the founder faster than they can be answered well: hiring is picking up, pay is inconsistent, managers are new to managing, or a hard situation has already been handled badly once. That is usually before a company can justify a full-time Head of People.
Can a Fractional HR leader handle compliance and employment law?
They keep your policies and practices current, flag risk early, and make sure the paperwork is done properly, which prevents most problems. They are not attorneys. When a question needs legal advice, a good Fractional HR leader knows it and brings in an employment lawyer.
What if the Fractional Head of People is not the right fit?
We re-match you free under the Nacho Guarantee until the fit is right. It is a re-match guarantee, not a money-back guarantee. Every person in the network lives and works in the United States, so a re-match never means going offshore.
Ready when you are
Take the people problems off the founder's desk.
Book a free, no-obligation discovery call. Tell us where hiring, pay, or management is breaking down and we'll tell you honestly whether Fractional HR is the right fix.