A ArchitectCOO.comFrank Fuentes · Fractional COO
Fractional COO for AI startups in architecture & construction

Your AI is ready.
Your operations
aren’t.

You’re building AI for architecture and construction — but architects stall, drafters don’t adopt, and you’re still running every hire, onboarding, and follow-up yourself. That’s not a product problem. That’s an operations problem. And it’s the one I solve.

“No one buys a consultant. They buy a solution to a painful, present problem.”

How I work, and how this page is built
Book a discovery call → See the $5k math ↓

$5,000/month Standard  ·  $9,500/month Premium  ·  No long-term executive hire

Black-and-white headshot of Frank Fuentes smiling in a suit and white shirt
Frank FuentesLicensed Architect · Fractional COO
12 years inside architecture
12 YRS · RA
My Experience: 12 YearsLicensed Architect in the industry
My Fee: $5,000/Moflat Fractional COO retainer
Compared to $220k–$320k/yrtypical full-time COO salary, not including equity
You Save $160k–$260kper year vs. full-time, before benefits

The painful, present problem

You don’t need another advisor.
You need the bottleneck gone.

Most AI-for-AEC founders I talk to aren’t failing on technology. They’re stuck in the messy middle between a promising demo and a real, repeatable business, inside an industry outsiders consistently misread.

01 / PILOT PURGATORY

Pilots that never convert

Firms try your tool, say “interesting,” then go quiet. No clear pilot owner, success criteria, or follow-up rhythm, so deals die slowly instead of closing.

02 / ADOPTION GAP

Architects don’t trust the output

Architects and GCs won’t risk drawings, schedules, or liability on a black box. If your onboarding doesn’t speak their workflow, adoption stalls on day one.

03 / FOUNDER AS OPS TEAM

You are the operating system

Hiring, onboarding, customer success, vendor follow-ups, internal meetings: it all runs through you. Every hour on ops is an hour not spent on product or fundraising.

04 / WRONG FEEDBACK

Feedback that misleads product

Without someone who has actually sat in a project meeting, run Construction Administration, and lived a deadline, you can’t tell a real workflow need from a one-off request.

05 / NO OPERATING RHYTHM

No cadence, No Accountability

No weekly priorities, no clear owners, no metrics that matter. The team is busy, but the company isn’t compounding.

06 / TOO EARLY FOR A COO

You need a COO: You Can’t Justify One

You need senior operational leadership now, but a full-time COO hire is a $220k–$320k bet you shouldn’t have to make at this stage.

If any of that sounds familiar, you don’t have a consulting problem. You have a present, expensive operations problem, and it gets more expensive every month it sits unsolved.

Talk it through →
Frank Fuentes, licensed architect and Fractional COO
Frank FuentesLicensed Architect · Founder & Operator · Fuentes Architecture

The insider edge

An operator who has actually been your customer.

Most fractional operators learn your industry from the outside. I’ve lived it from the inside (12 years as a licensed architect), and I’ve also built and run businesses of my own. That combination is rare, and for AI in architecture & construction, it’s the whole advantage.

  • 12 years as a licensed architect. I know how firms actually buy, pilot, and adopt software: project deadlines, liability, Revit workflows, partners, and all.
  • I speak both languages. I can sit with your engineering team in the morning and translate for an architecture principal in the afternoon, without losing what matters in either room.
  • Builder-operator, not a theorist. I run my own architecture practice and have built multiple operating businesses from scratch: hiring, pricing, delivery, and systems included.
  • Elite execution discipline. The same operating rigor that carried me through 12 years of practice and high-performance training goes into your weekly cadence, metrics, and follow-through.
Licensed Architect 12 Years in AEC Founder & Operator AI × Architecture & Construction

Tech-fluent, not tech-adjacent

He doesn’t just advise AI startups.
He runs on AI himself.

Frank works hands-on with the leading AI models every day, the same class of tools your startup is building. He uses them to run his architecture practice and his businesses, tests new models as they ship, and knows the difference between a slick demo and a tool that survives a real workflow. That matters when your whole company is a bet on AI adoption.

Muse Claude ChatGPT Gemini + the rest of the modern AI stack
Daily Driver

AI is in his actual workflow

Drafting, research, analysis, planning, and operations: Frank uses AI assistants like Muse, Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini in his day-to-day work, not as a novelty. He feels the same friction your users feel, because he is one.

Model Judgment

Model-agnostic, honestly opinionated

Different models are good at different things, and the leaderboard changes monthly. Working across them daily gives him a practical sense of each one’s strengths, blind spots, and failure modes, the judgment your team needs when choosing what to build on.

Builder’s Eye

He can tell a demo from a deployment

Because he builds with these tools himself, he spots early where an AI product will break in a real firm’s workflow, and what onboarding, guardrails, and human-in-the-loop steps it takes to make it stick.

Credibility With Buyers

He speaks “AI” to people who fear it

Most AEC buyers are skeptical of AI. Frank can sit in their meeting as a peer, a licensed architect who genuinely uses this technology, and make the case for adoption in language that lands.

The math: read this before you say it’s expensive

“$5,000 a month is too expensive.”
Is it though?

A full-time COO can easily cost $220,000 to $320,000 a year, plus equity. That’s $18,300 to $26,700 a month, before benefits, bonuses, and other employment costs. Compare that honestly:

Full-time COO
$18,300–$26,700 / month

$220,000–$320,000 per year, plus equity

  • Base salary$220k–$320k / yr
  • Benefits, payroll taxes, bonusesOn top
  • EquityExpected
  • Paid vacation & PTOYou pay it
  • Search + ramp timeMonths
  • If it’s the wrong hireExpensive to undo
Frank: Fractional COO
$5,000 / month

$60,000 per year. Operational leadership, without another full-time exec.

  • Flat monthly retainer$5,000
  • Payroll taxesNone
  • Employee benefitsNone
  • Paid vacationNone
  • EquityNone required
  • Long-term executive hireNo
Claim the $5,000 retainer →
You keep
$160k–$260k / year

That’s the difference between a full-time COO salary and this retainer, before you even count benefits, bonuses, payroll taxes, and equity. Put it back into product, pilots, and runway.

Full-time / month$22,500
Fractional / month$5,000
You save / year$210,000

Salary only. Real full-time cost is higher once benefits, bonuses, payroll taxes, and equity are added.

No payroll taxesNo employee benefitsNo paid vacationNo long-term executive hireNo equity give-upNo 6-month search

Choose your tier

Two tiers. Two levels of involvement.

Start with the Basic retainer for operating guidance and cadence, or step up to Premium when you want me embedded deeper and running operations with you week to week.

Basic Tier: I advise your operating system.

Premium Tier: I run it for you.

Basic Tier: Fractional COO
$5,000 / month

$60,000 per year. Fractional COO leadership on a monthly retainer.

Basic Tier: I advise your operating system.

  • RoleAdvise and guide
  • Operating cadenceIncluded
  • Pilot and customer opsGuidance
  • Hiring and onboardingSystems and Advice
  • Payroll taxes and benefitsNone
  • EquityNone required

Best if you have a team to execute and need a senior operator to advise the system, set the cadence, and keep priorities clear.

Claim the $5,000 Basic Tier →
Premium Premium Tier: Fractional COO
$9,500 / month

$114,000 per year. Everything in Basic, with more embedded time and priority communication.

Premium Tier: I run it for you.

  • Availability3 days per week max
  • AccessNot unlimited access
  • Slack communicationSame-day
  • Term3-Month Minimum Required
  • IncludesEverything in Basic
  • Payroll taxes and benefitsNone

Premium is capped at 3 days per week max, not unlimited access. You get same-day Slack communication and a 3-Month Minimum Term Required so the work has time to compound.

Claim the $9,500 Premium Tier →

What the retainer actually buys

Not Just Advice. An operating system for your startup.

You’re not buying hours or decks. You’re buying the problem above (solved, week after week) by someone who understands your buyers because he’s been one.

Pilot → Paid

Pilot-to-paid conversion system

Clear pilot owners, success criteria, check-in cadence, and follow-up, designed around how architecture firms and contractors actually evaluate tools, so pilots stop drifting and start closing.

Operating Cadence

Weekly rhythm & accountability

Priorities, owners, and metrics your whole team can see. I run the operating cadence so decisions get made, blockers get cleared, and you get your time back.

AEC Translation

Product & customer translation

I turn architect and contractor feedback into product priorities you can trust, and turn your product roadmap into language AEC buyers actually believe.

Team & Hiring Ops

Hiring, onboarding & team systems

Role scorecards, interview loops, and onboarding that get new hires productive fast, without you personally carrying every step.

Customer Ops

Onboarding & customer success ops

A repeatable path from signed pilot to active, retained customer: templates, playbooks, and follow-through built for AEC sales cycles.

Founder Leverage

Your time, back where it belongs

Product, customers, and fundraising are founder work. Operations shouldn’t consume them. I absorb the operational load so you can do the work only you can do.

How it starts

Simple. Fast. No executive search.

No months-long hiring process. No equity negotiation. If we’re a fit, we start solving the problem.

STEP 01

Discovery call

We name the painful, present problem honestly (where pilots, adoption, or your own time are breaking down) and decide if I’m the right solution for it.

STEP 02

First 30 days: stabilize

I audit your current operations, install a weekly cadence, and fix the highest-leverage bottleneck first: usually pilots, onboarding, or founder overload.

STEP 03

Ongoing: $5,000 or $9,500/month

Fractional COO leadership on retainer. Basic at $5,000/month: I advise your operating system. Premium at $9,500/month: I run it for you, up to 3 days per week, with a 3-month minimum.

Start with Step 01 → Book a call

Is this for you?

Built for a specific founder at a specific moment.

✓  A strong fit if you…

  • Are building AI for architecture, construction, or the built environment
  • Have a product or early pilots, but operations are the bottleneck
  • Are losing deals or time because no one on the team has lived AEC workflows
  • Need COO-level leadership now, without a $220k–$320k full-time hire

Not the right fit if you…

  • Just want a consultant to validate decisions you’ve already made
  • Don’t have a product or customers yet: you need validation first
  • Need a full-time, on-site executive 50+ hours a week
  • Aren’t ready to run a real weekly operating cadence

Questions, answered straight

What does $5,000/month actually cover?

Fractional COO leadership on a monthly retainer: operating cadence, pilot and customer operations, hiring and onboarding systems, and AEC translation between your team and your buyers. It’s senior operational leadership, scoped fractionally, so you don’t pay full-time executive cost. Basic Tier: I advise your operating system.

What does the Premium Tier include?

Premium is $9,500/month. Premium Tier: I run it for you. It includes everything in Basic, up to 3 days per week max (not unlimited access), same-day Slack communication, and a 3-Month Minimum Term Required.

Why does your architecture background matter for an AI startup?

Because your buyers are architects and builders. With 12 years as a licensed architect, I know how they evaluate risk, run projects, and decide what software survives contact with a real deadline. That insight shapes your pilots, onboarding, messaging, and product priorities from day one.

Is this a long-term contract or executive hire?

Neither tier is a full-time executive hire: no payroll taxes, no employee benefits, no paid vacation, and no equity required. Basic is a $5,000 monthly retainer. Premium is $9,500/month with a 3-Month Minimum Term Required, capped at 3 days per week max.

How is this different from hiring a consultant?

No one buys a consultant. They buy a solution to a painful, present problem. I don’t sell reports. I embed as your operator, run the cadence, own the follow-through, and stay accountable to outcomes week after week.

The problem won’t
wait for a perfect hire.

Every month without an operator is another month of stalled pilots, missed follow-ups, and founder hours burned on work a COO should own. Solve it now for $5,000/month Basic, or $9,500/month Premium.

Basic Tier: I advise your operating system.
Premium Tier: I run it for you.

Fractional COO Retainer
$5,000 / month

Basic Tier: I advise your operating system.

  • 12-year licensed architect as your operator
  • Built for AI in architecture & construction
  • No benefits, payroll taxes, PTO, or equity
  • No long-term executive hire
Premium Tier
$9,500 / month

Premium Tier: I run it for you.

  • 3 days per week max, not unlimited access
  • Same-day Slack communication
  • 3-Month Minimum Term Required
Book your discovery call →

Prefer email? Frank@FuentesArchitecture.com