Services
Four ways to work
with AY Partners.
Every engagement is scoped to your stage, your team, and the specific bottleneck blocking your next milestone. No retainer minimums. No boilerplate frameworks. Just focused work that ships.
Most Requested
Fractional
CPO
Senior product leadership embedded in your team — without the 6-month hiring timeline or the $400k+ full-time cost. I own the roadmap, align your stakeholders, and drive execution on your highest-priority initiatives.
What you get
- Multi-quarter roadmap ownership — sequenced, de-risked, and tied to business outcomes, not features
- OKR alignment — product goals wired to company objectives with clear leading indicators
- Weekly sprint and triage cadence — I run the product operating rhythm so your team ships consistently
- Bi-quarterly milestone planning — keeps the longer arc visible while teams focus on the sprint in front of them
- Cross-functional stakeholder alignment — I represent product in leadership conversations and keep engineering and design moving in the same direction
- PM team mentorship and hiring — build the product team structure and culture that outlasts the engagement
Engagement Details
Format
Ongoing monthly engagement
Commitment
2–3 days per week, minimum 3 months
Best for
Series B+ startup without a CPO or with a product leadership gap
Team size
50–300 employees
Fixed Scope
0 → 1
Product Sprint
From ambiguous idea to a validated, shippable plan — in weeks, not quarters. Designed for teams that need to move fast without building the wrong thing. Every sprint ends with a backlog your engineers can actually execute against.
What you get
- User discovery sprint — structured interviews, jobs-to-be-done analysis, and a synthesized insight report
- MVP scope definition — what to build first, what to cut, and why — with the trade-offs documented
- Phased release plan — sequenced milestones with dependencies called out and rollback options defined
- Go/no-go framework — explicit success criteria, risk matrix, and the conditions under which you stop or scale
- Prioritized backlog — ready for engineering sprint planning on day one after handoff
- Technical readiness review — a gut-check with your engineering lead on feasibility and build order
Engagement Details
Format
Fixed-scope sprint
Duration
3–6 weeks, depending on scope
Best for
Teams pre-launch or launching a major new product line or feature
Team size
Any size — works best when engineering and design are already in place
Reference: At Gopuff, I ran an MVP sprint that went from kickoff to working product in one week — then scaled to 600+ sites within a month.
Launch Ready
GTM
Readiness
A battle-tested pilot-to-scale launch framework. Built from running a live Uber integration and a 600-site national rollout — this isn't theory. It's how you ship something once and then roll it out without breaking things.
What you get
- Launch sequencing plan — who gets access when, in what order, and why — with rollback triggers defined
- Pilot design — a time-boxed test with pre-defined success criteria and a clear decision point to scale or stop
- Cross-functional RACI — who owns what across product, engineering, ops, sales, and customer success
- Launch risk matrix — the top 5 failure modes and the mitigation plan for each
- Post-launch iteration cadence — the 30/60/90-day review structure that keeps momentum after the ship date
Engagement Details
Format
Project-based engagement
Duration
4–8 weeks including pilot support
Best for
Post-PMF teams preparing a major launch, new market, or platform expansion
Proven at
Gopuff (600+ sites), S'well (22 launches, 100% on-time)
Ongoing Support
Strategic
Advisory
A senior product thought partner for founders and heads of product who need outside perspective without the overhead. Monthly sessions designed to pressure-test decisions before you make them.
What you get
- Monthly 90-min strategy session — structured around your highest-priority roadmap or organizational decision
- Roadmap review and pressure-testing — I'll challenge the sequencing, surface hidden assumptions, and help you prioritize ruthlessly
- Prioritization and trade-off frameworks — concrete decision-making tools you can use independently between sessions
- Async support between sessions — Slack or email for quick unblocks, reviews, or sanity checks
Engagement Details
Format
Monthly retainer
Commitment
Month-to-month, no long-term lock-in
Best for
Founders or heads of product who have a team but need a senior sounding board
The most common reason founders choose advisory: they don't need embedded help yet — they need someone who has been three steps ahead of where they are now.
Compare Engagements
Not sure which fits? Here's the map.
| Factor | Fractional CPO | 0→1 Sprint | GTM Readiness | Advisory |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Best stage | Series B+ | Any (pre-launch) | Post-PMF | Any |
| Duration | 3+ months ongoing | 3–6 weeks | 4–8 weeks | Month-to-month |
| Weekly hours | 16–24 hrs / week | Full sprint focus | Project-paced | 2–4 hrs / month |
| Roadmap ownership | ● Full ownership | ● For the sprint | ◐ Launch scope | ○ Review only |
| Embedded in team | ● | ● | ◐ During pilot | ○ |
| User research | ● Ongoing | ● Discovery sprint | ◐ As needed | ○ |
| Team building | ● Hiring + mentoring | ○ | ○ | ◐ Coaching only |
● Full ◐ Partial ○ Not included
Common Questions
Frequently asked
Do you work with early-stage (pre-Series A) startups?
Sometimes — through the Strategic Advisory or 0→1 Sprint engagements. The Fractional CPO is a better fit once you have a product team in place. If you're pre-seed or seed, let's talk and I'll tell you honestly whether this is the right time.
How many clients do you take at once?
Fractional CPO: maximum 2 active engagements at a time, to protect quality and focus. Sprints and advisory can run alongside. I'll be upfront about availability on the first call.
What does the first month typically look like?
Week 1 is diagnosis — I meet every key stakeholder, review existing roadmaps and research, and form a clear point of view on what's blocking you. Week 2 is alignment. Weeks 3–4 we're executing. There is no "onboarding quarter."
Do you work remotely or in-person?
Primarily remote, with quarterly on-site visits included in Fractional CPO engagements. Based in New York — travel to SF, Boston, Chicago, and other major startup hubs is straightforward.
What industries do you work in?
Deep experience in marketplace, delivery and logistics, consumer goods, e-commerce, and B2B SaaS. The skills — discovery, roadmap discipline, GTM execution — transfer across verticals. If you're uncertain, describe your problem on the call and I'll tell you whether I can add real value.
What happens after an engagement ends?
Every engagement is designed to leave your team stronger than when we started — documented processes, trained PMs, and a roadmap you own. Most clients transition to the advisory tier after a Fractional CPO engagement to maintain a lightweight connection.
Still deciding?
Tell me your problem.
I'll tell you which fits.
30 minutes. No pitch. You describe the challenge, I tell you what I see — and which engagement, if any, makes sense.