Rhys Holding and Sam Loyd on the rise of fractional leadership in the UAE
Fractional leadership is emerging as one of the fastest-growing trends in leadership hiring worldwide, and the UAE is no exception. Rhys Holding and Sam Loyd are tapping into this growing market with Fractional – we sat down with the co-founders to discuss why the model is gaining momentum and its main benefits.
To start with, why is the fractional leadership model gaining traction globally and in the UAE right now?
Sam: Record levels of new business formation in recent years have normalised on-demand senior leadership globally. C-suite interim engagements have risen 151% globally since 2021 and professionals listing “fractional” in their LinkedIn profile have grown from around 2,000 in 2022 to more than 142,000 by early 2025.
That’s not a trend, it’s a structural shift in how businesses want to hire senior talent and how talent wants to work. SMEs now account for more than 80% of demand for high-end interim talent. That same demand is now playing out in the UAE, where SMEs are experiencing the benefits of the fractional model first hand.
How is the UAE positioned for a fractional C-suite model compared to other markets?
Sam: The UAE has the conditions that built this model elsewhere, but concentrated. SMEs account for around 94% of all businesses in the UAE.
According to research, a quarter of UAE CEOs cite a lack of key skills among their top business threats, and 90% of GCC organisations reported skills gaps in 2025. Put simply, the conditions that drove adoption internationally are now firmly present in the UAE market, at a scale most other markets don’t have.
What gap in the SME market is Fractional aiming to solve?
Rhys: Having built, run and sold an SME myself, I’ve experienced this gap from the inside. The UAE now has more than 1.4 million registered companies, with 250,000 added in 2025 alone. Growth creates pressure. Leadership gaps appear. Costs climb. Founders find themselves making executive-level decisions without executive-level support.
The traditional answer, hiring a full-time C-suite leader, can be a slow and expensive process, offering the wrong fit for a business still finding its footing. That’s the exact moment we built Fractional to solve for: senior leadership, embedded and accountable, at a cost that reflects where most SMEs actually are.
What types of business challenges or situations are SMEs typically bringing to Fractional?
Rhys: Almost every founder we speak to is dealing with the same thing at different volumes. They are making executive-level decisions across every part of the business, often without executive-level support around them.
In practice that shows up as preparing for a funding round, professionalising operations, entering a new market, replacing or supplementing leadership, managing a defined project, or needing specialist executive support without hiring full-time.
How flexible is the fractional engagement model for SMEs of different sizes and stages?
Rhys: Flexibility is a key foundation of the fractional model. Whether that means one day a month, three days a week, or a defined engagement, the model can scale up or down as priorities shift.
How does the cost of fractional leadership compare to hiring a full-time C-suite executive in the UAE?
Rhys: The cost savings can be quite significant and founders feel it immediately once they see it laid out. For example, a full-time CFO in a UAE SME commands a base salary of AED 61,000 to 92,000 per month, before housing, transport, bonus, benefits, visa costs and end-of-service gratuity, all of which push total compensation well beyond the base figure alone.
Fractional leadership typically runs at 30% to 60% less on average than that full-time cost (depending on seniority, scope and engagement structure), meaning businesses can still have accountability but without the overhead.
What industries or SME segments are currently showing the strongest demand?
Rhys: Demand is coming from anywhere where growth outpaces leadership capacity. Fractional serves companies across all industries, with a particular focus on SMEs with 10 to 200 employees navigating critical points of growth, transition or leadership change.
At Fractional, our typical client revenue sits between $2 million and $40 million – this is generally where founders start needing C-suite thinking but can’t yet justify a full-time hire.
What are the biggest misconceptions about fractional leadership in this region?
Rhys: The biggest misconception is that a fractional executive is a consultant who advises and steps away. A fractional executive is a senior leader who advises and executes, embedded as part of the leadership team, not sitting outside it.
These are leaders who have navigated growth, disruption and transformation, and can do it again, including turnaround and crisis-management specialists available at short notice. Businesses get that same calibre of judgement, deployed with intent rather than by default.
Finally, what is the long-term vision for Fractional in the UAE and wider GCC market?
Sam: Our long-term vision is to redefine how SMEs across the UAE and wider GCC access senior leadership, giving them the ability to bring in senior C-suite talent exactly when they need it.
By building the region’s strongest collective of curated fractional executives, Fractional aims to make fractional leadership a recognised, trusted and mainstream model for SME growth. The goal is to ultimately become the home of fractional leadership across the GCC and, eventually, globally.
