Many companies with 20 to 250 employees have day-to-day IT under control (tickets get solved, devices get maintained) and yet nobody owns the bigger decisions: which systems to replace, how much to budget, which supplier to keep, which risks to accept. That gap is the CIO role, and our fractional CIO (vCIO) service fills it on a part-time basis.
It is a good fit for Spanish SMEs and for international companies running offices in Spain or Portugal that need local IT leadership aligned with headquarters. We do not replace your IT team or support provider; we give them direction. If we also run your support, we keep the vCIO role separate from operations so the advice stays in your interest.
What a fractional CIO does
A vCIO's work spans five responsibilities that, in a company without an IT director, are usually split between the managing director, finance and whichever supplier is closest:
IT strategy and roadmap
We start from business goals (growth, a new office, digitising a process, passing an audit) and turn them into a prioritised 12 to 24-month technology roadmap: which projects, in what order, at what cost and which risk each one reduces. We review it with management every quarter.
Budget and cost control
We build the annual IT budget, separating recurring costs (licences, support, connectivity) from investments, and review what is already being paid: unused licences, duplicate contracts, oversized services. The goal is that every euro has a reason.
Vendors and contracts
We act as your technical counterpart with suppliers: defining requirements, comparing offers on the same criteria, reviewing service-level agreements and tracking delivery. Before signing a support contract, our IT outsourcing decision guide covers the points worth agreeing in writing.
Security and compliance governance
We set the baseline policies, the asset and risk inventory and who is responsible for what. We coordinate audits and customer requirements (NIS2, Spain's ENS, ISO 27001, security questionnaires from large customers) and bring in our cybersecurity services when a dedicated security specialist is needed.
Reporting to management
Every month or quarter we give management a short report: project status, relevant incidents, open risks, spend against budget and decisions pending. In business language, not technical jargon.
When a vCIO makes sense
- The company has grown, but IT is still organised as it was with ten people.
- Three or four IT suppliers are involved and none of them answers for the whole.
- A large customer, a tender or an auditor is asking for policies, evidence or a security plan nobody knows how to prepare.
- A major project is coming (a new ERP, a cloud migration, a new site) and the customer side needs someone to lead it.
- A subsidiary in Spain or Portugal needs local IT leadership that follows group standards and reports to headquarters.
- The person who knew everything has left and the knowledge has to be rebuilt.
If what is missing is capacity to resolve incidents rather than judgement to decide, you need IT outsourcing or managed IT services, not a vCIO.
Fractional CIO, in-house CIO or one-off consulting
| In-house CIO | Fractional CIO (vCIO) | One-off consulting | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Time commitment | Full time | Agreed hours or days per month | A project with a start and end |
| Continuity | High | High, with periodic review | Ends with the deliverable |
| Cost | Executive salary and overhead | Monthly fee proportional to time | Fixed project price |
| Market perspective | Depends on their background | Benchmarks across many companies and vendors | High, but limited to the brief |
| Typical fit | Large or tech-heavy companies | SMEs and mid-sized firms without an IT director | A specific decision or audit |
The path is often gradual: an initial IT consulting engagement for the assessment, then a vCIO who executes and maintains the roadmap.
How the service works
- Initial assessment: interviews with management and key staff, inventory of systems, contracts and risks, and a review of current spend.
- Roadmap and budget: a prioritised 12 to 24-month proposal that management approves or adjusts.
- Agreed monthly commitment: regular meetings with management, project and vendor follow-up, and availability for decisions that cannot wait.
- Quarterly review: progress is measured, priorities are updated and the time commitment is adjusted if needed.
We work in English or Spanish with management and in Spanish or Portuguese with local teams and suppliers.
Working with headquarters and local teams
For international groups, the hardest part of IT in a Spanish or Portuguese subsidiary is rarely the technology. It is keeping local decisions aligned with group standards while dealing with local suppliers, contracts, language and regulation. A fractional CIO sits in that gap: we take the group's policies and roadmap as the reference, translate them into local projects and purchases, and report back to headquarters in the format it already uses.
In practice that means one person who knows both sides: which local telecoms or support contract can be renegotiated, which requirement from a Spanish customer or auditor affects the group, and which proposal from a local supplier should go to the group architecture team before anyone signs. It also means continuity when the local office manager or the only internal IT person changes, because the inventory, contracts and decisions are documented rather than remembered.
What you get
- A named IT leader accountable to management.
- A prioritised technology roadmap, reviewed every quarter.
- A reasoned IT budget that separates recurring costs from investments.
- Suppliers with measurable objectives and service agreements.
- An inventory of systems, contracts and risks that does not live in one person's memory.
- Regular reports that let management decide without being technology experts.
We work on site in Madrid and remotely with companies across Spain and Portugal. With 26 years supporting businesses and more than 470 organisations served, we bring tested judgement about what works and what does not in companies like yours.
Request a consultation: we start with an assessment of your systems, contracts and risks and propose the right vCIO commitment.