Digital Leadership & Interim CDO
Interim Digital Leadership. Responsibility from Day 1.
When your data function needs a head, or your strategy needs an independent view. Real CDO practice, clear responsibility, partnership-based.
Book a free introductory call30 minutes. We get to know each other. You decide if it fits.
Current state
You might recognise this.
The data function needs a head. You don't have six months.
The CDO position is vacant, the data office has no clear head, or the function needs to be built from scratch. While the search runs, topics wait, stakeholders get impatient, and the risk grows that the next strategy gets shaped without data.
You carry the decision. Without an external view on your own logic.
Your strategy is set, but no internal sparring partner has the distance and depth to challenge it honestly. The board goes along, the team executes, and in between someone is missing who thinks with you but isn't dependent on you.
Change is coming. The senior level for it isn't in-house.
M&A, reorganisation, new business models, strategy pivot. These phases need senior responsibility that has been through such situations before. When that level is missing internally, the next few weeks are more valuable than the time the search would take.
In interim mandates, time is the scarcest resource. What takes six weeks of ramp-up in a standard consulting engagement takes two here. I don't step in to advise. I step in to lead.
My approach
Three steps. Fast. With clear responsibility.
No onboarding marathon. No strategy workshop before any decisions get made. I step in, take over, hand over.
Step in
In the first weeks I get to know your business. Topics, stakeholders, team, open decisions, political lines. Fast, because in interim mandates time is the scarcest resource, but clean enough to be operational afterwards.
Day 1 to Week 3
Take responsibility
I take over the function in full. Decisions, board communication, team leadership, stakeholder management. What's burning operationally gets solved first. What's been open strategically for too long gets an answer. During the mandate, I am part of your organisation, not outside of it.
Main mandate
Hand over
Structured handover to the permanent appointment or back to you. Knowledge, relationships, open topics, documented and discussed. If you want, I stay available as a sparring partner afterwards, without a new mandate.
Final phase
You know the function needs a head. Or that your strategy deserves an external view.
Spend 30 minutes with someone who has been on both sides of this.
Areas of focus
Where we focus.
Interim CDO
When the CDO position is vacant or newly created, I take over the function. Strategy, roadmap, stakeholder management, team leadership. Until the permanent appointment is in place, or until the topic is strategically carried through.
Interim Head of Data
Operational leadership of the data office, analytics team or a newly built data unit. With clear focus on outcomes, not on extending the engagement.
Building a data function
When the data function needs to be built from scratch: structure, roles, accountabilities, reporting lines, technical foundations, onboarding of the first key roles. I shape the function you'll later staff.
C-level sparring
For CDOs, CIOs and CTOs who need an independent sparring partner for strategic decisions. Architecture, vendor choice, reorganisation, reporting to the board. Confidential, without political agenda.
Digital transformation lead on time
When a transformation programme needs a lead who understands business, technology and organisation at the same time. Responsibility from the board slide down to the architecture decision.
Support in staffing
Sharpening the role profile with the board, interview sparring with the technical depth HR processes often lack, onboarding support for the final candidate. So the next appointment actually fits.
Why DRICH.CONSULTING
Real CDO practice. Responsibility, not just recommendations.
Interim placement agencies deliver profiles. I work with you directly, without an agency layer. I've worked as a software developer, architect, IT project lead and Chief Data Officer. I've implemented and accompanied data strategies at enterprise level. This isn't consulting experience with a CDO angle. It's the role itself.
Real CDO practice, not just consulting experience
I was Chief Data Officer and have helped implement data strategies at enterprise level. You see that practice immediately when I step into the role: stakeholder language, board communication, team leadership and technical depth in one person.
Responsibility from Day 1
No onboarding marathon, no strategy workshop cycle before decisions get made. I take over responsibility, make the decisions that can't wait, and move the topics that have been open too long.
Partnership-based, as equals, with a clear vision
During the mandate, I am part of your organisation, not outside of it. With the same posture, the same effort and the same accountability as someone who stays. As equals with the board and the team, with a clear vision of what should stand at the end of the mandate.
100 percent independent
No agency layer, no commissions, no commercial interests in software or tools I later recommend. You get an interim manager who follows only your company, not an agency business model.
20+
years of IT and
data experience
CDO
data strategies implemented
at enterprise level
100%
independent, no
agency layer
2
mid-sized and enterprise
from own practice
Frequently asked
What decision-makers ask us.
Agencies deliver profiles. I work with you directly, without an intermediary. For the mandate, I am part of your organisation, with the same posture as someone who stays. After the mandate, I remain available as a sparring partner if you want.
Usually within two to four weeks. For acute vacancies, shorter ramp-up phases can be agreed. The clean start matters more than the date, because in interim mandates a rushed start without briefing usually costs more than the wait would have.
Six to eighteen months. Shorter mandates for clearly scoped topics, for example setting up a data strategy or stabilising a function. Longer for transformation or build-up mandates. Extensions happen only when both sides see the value.
For interim mandates, often yes. 30 minutes are usually enough to see whether the requirement matches my profile and whether the chemistry works. If not, I say so directly and may recommend someone from my network.
Structured handover to the permanent role or back to you. Knowledge, relationships, open topics, documented and discussed. If you want, I stay available as a sparring partner afterwards, without a new mandate. If not, we close out cleanly.
Full. During the mandate I work on your matter with the same posture as someone who stays. Identification is part of my working style, not sales copy. When I take a mandate, I represent your company, not my next project.
Introductory call
Free introductory call
Tell us your situation. We listen, ask questions and tell you honestly whether I am the right partner. If not, that's fine too.
- 30 minutes. No pitch, no presentation.
- You describe the problem. We listen first.
- You get an initial read, with no sales intent.
- No commitment afterwards.
Slots are offered on weekdays between 9am and 6pm (CET).
Data function without a head? Strategy without sparring?
Book a free introductory call