This map is built for a larger screen. Open it on a laptop or desktop to explore it.

Group the map by Three gears Time · Tools & Systems · Mindset

Find an item

Drag to turn, scroll to zoom, arrow keys to pan, click an item to open it.

As of 2026-11

How a solo fractional runs like a firm

One principal. Every recurring job has an agent, a skill or a script. Every judgement call is still mine.

Three years of writing down what I learned, so the system could carry the rest.

I run High Growth Tech on my own, as a fractional CTO and technology advisor. Twelve agents, 28 skills and a set of scripts carry the sales admin, meeting transcripts, timesheets, invoicing and report drafting. I keep the client work, the decisions and every step that can't be undone. It took six layers to get here, each one built on the last, starting with an operations manual I ran by hand in 2023. This map walks through those layers, then lets you explore the whole practice as it stood in November 2026.

Chapter 1 of 6 · 2023-05

The manual

In May 2023 I started a Google Doc called Operations Processes. Sales, onboarding, delivery, offboarding and finance, each written as steps I could follow by hand.

Every review stage ended with a block of an hour or two to improve the process, booked as its own line on the timesheet. That habit of writing down what I'd learned, straight after I learned it, is the thread through everything that follows.

Retired along the way: Nothing yet. Every step is mine.

Chapter 2 of 6 · 2023-12

Prompts by hand

Next, AI notetakers transcribed my business meetings, with everyone's agreement. I ran Gemini Gems and Notebook prompts over those transcripts to draft review findings and sales documents, with a prompt builder sheet to assemble the inputs.

It saved hours, but I was still the integration layer. Each time, I gathered the context, pasted it in and checked what came back.

Retired along the way: Typing up meeting notes, and first drafts from a blank page.

Chapter 3 of 6 · 2024-07

The Brain

Then I separated facts from procedure. Facts went into fact files: how I invoice, how deals move, how a review runs, what the brand allows. An agent reads the relevant file before it acts, the same way a new starter reads the handbook.

The Brain became its own store and the single source of truth. When something goes wrong, the rule that prevents it is written into the fact file where it belongs, dated to the day it happened.

Retired along the way: Pasting the same context into every prompt.

Chapter 4 of 6 · 2025-02

Skills and scripts

Procedure became skills: written instructions an agent follows, with judgement calls handed back to me. The parts that must come out the same every time became scripts, which are tested and version-controlled.

The manual shrank. Most of its sections now say the step is handled by a named skill, and what's left are the judgement calls and the steps that can't be undone.

Retired along the way: Gemini Gems, Notebook prompts and the prompt builder sheet, and most of the manual's steps.

Chapter 5 of 6 · 2025-09

Agents that run the recurring work

Recurring work moved to scheduled agents on Polytask: meeting transcripts, timesheets, the invoice run, pay runs, supplier paperwork, the vendor ledger, deal filing and a morning triage.

Each agent has a brief, the access it needs and a schedule or a trigger. They draft and file; I approve and send.

Retired along the way: The finance and IT scripts, once the agents took over those writes.

Chapter 6 of 6 · 2026-04

The data backbone

Finally, the spreadsheets gave way to hgt-core, one relational store for organisations, contacts, deals, projects, timesheets, invoice runs and transcripts. Agents and skills read and write the same records through one interface.

My day is simpler than it was in 2023. The work moves through one backbone, and the decisions still come to me.

Retired along the way: Cowork, the spreadsheets of record (now read-only fallbacks), and more scripts.

↑

Getting around the map