There's an assumption that mentorship is for people at the beginning or a career transition - for the professionals who've just stepped away from a full-time role, unsure how to position themselves, pricing their first engagement with trepidation. It is for those people, but not them alone.
Some of the most valuable moments in a fractional career happen not at the start, but at the point where you've already proved something to yourself - and you're trying to figure out what comes next.
The part nobody warns you about
Most people who transition into fractional and advisory work spend the first few years focused on the foundations: building a client base, refining how they talk about what they do, learning the pace and rhythm of a portfolio career. That stretch is absorbing enough and demands all of your attention.
What catches people by surprise is the moment when that phase ends. When you've been doing this for a few years, you have proof of concept, you have clients, you have a track record, yet you still feel like there's a ceiling you haven't broken through. For many experienced fractional professionals, that ceiling is the board and specifically a non-executive director role or a board advisory appointment at an established company, with more meaningful strategic responsibility.
Getting there from fractional executive work isn't automatic. It requires a different kind of repositioning, a different set of conversations, and often a different kind of support.
Five years in with more to unlock
Hidai Degani has been working in fractional and advisory roles for over six years. He built his consultancy without a structured programme behind him - Connectd didn't exist when he started out - and by most measures he was succeeding: clients, revenue, a growing reputation.
But five years in, he could see there was a level he hadn't reached. Formal board advisory work and non-executive directorship. The kind of governance-heavy roles that require a different presentation of your expertise, a different network, and a level of credibility that's harder to build informally.
"I could do it on my own," he reflects. "It would take a while. I might make mistakes. Or I might just stick to what I know because it's easier. But if I joined and committed time, energy and money to it, then I was committed to success."
He joined Connectd's Transition to Portfolio programme. Not as someone starting from scratch, but as someone who knew exactly what they needed to unlock - and had decided to stop waiting to figure it out alone.
What mentorship looks like when you're already experienced
The support that matters at this stage isn't the same as it is at the beginning of the journey. You don't need someone to explain what fractional work is or how to update your LinkedIn. You need someone to challenge the assumptions you've built up over years of doing it a particular way. To ask you harder questions about where you're really heading and why. To hold you accountable to the goals you say you have.
"I needed to be pushed to achieve my goals," Hidai says. "So eventually I chose Connectd - because if I'm really serious about achieving my strategic goals, I need to commit to that."
The mentor at this stage is less a guide and more a thinking partner who has been where you're trying to go. Someone who has sat on boards, navigated the transition from fractional executive to non-exec, and can tell you not just what to do but what it actually feels like to do it.
The unexpected outcome
What Hidai didn't predict when he joined was that he would eventually become a mentor himself.
"Becoming a mentor was not something I planned. It just happened."
He's now one of the mentors in Connectd's programme - supporting professionals who are at different stages of the journey he's been on. Some are just starting out, taking their first calls with founders. Others are further along, working to position themselves for board and advisory roles. He knows both of those moments from the inside.
"When my mentees tell me about those first moments - the first time a founder really listened, the first time they felt like an expert - I'm very happy."
That circle - member to mentor — is, in many ways, the fullest expression of what the programme is designed to produce. Not just a placement, but a professional who has genuinely completed another stage career transition and has the experience and confidence to help others do the same.
The question worth sitting with
If you've been doing fractional or advisory work for a few years and you feel like you're circling the next level without quite reaching it - the board seat, the NED appointment, the more significant advisory role - the question isn't whether you could get there alone.
You probably could.
The question is whether you're actually going to, and how long you're willing to wait.
"Everything is possible without a mentor," Hidai says. "It just might be longer. You might make mistakes you could have avoided. The beginning, and the key transitions, are the hardest parts. Having someone in your corner - preparing you, challenging you, being there when it matters - I think that makes a real difference."
The right mentorship at the right time doesn't take the work away, it just means you're not doing all of it alone.
If you're earlier in the journey and still looking for the right mentor, read our guide to finding a mentor who understands fractional leadership →
Find out more about the Transition to Portfolio programme at Connectd →
