Fortune-500 IT Leadership. SMB Price Tag.
Strategic technology direction for Dallas–Fort Worth businesses that need CIO-level thinking without a CIO-level salary. Roadmaps, budgets, vendor management, and board-ready reporting — delivered by someone who actually ran IT at global banks.
Great Ops, No Strategy. You're Not Growing — You're Reacting.
You have a help desk. You have someone patching servers. You have a firewall that works most of the time. But nobody is looking two years out. Nobody is telling your board, in English, what the technology risk is. And every renewal, every capital request, every audit — you're improvising.
The gap between a good MSP and a real IT leader is the gap between "the servers are up" and "here's the 12-month plan, tied to your growth targets, with a defensible budget."
A vCIO closes that gap. Not by taking over your operations — by giving your leadership team the same seat at the table a Fortune-500 CIO gives theirs.
IT without strategy
- Budgets built in a spreadsheet, once a year
- Renewals negotiated the week they expire
- Vendors talk to your bookkeeper
- Board hears "IT is fine" until it isn't
vCIO with 48 Technologies
vCIO with 48 Technologies- 12-month rolling roadmap tied to growth
- Renewals & vendors managed proactively
- Board-ready reporting, in plain English
- One accountable owner, on your team
The Four Jobs a Real CIO Does.
A vCIO engagement isn't advice-by-the-hour. It's a defined operating model with four recurring deliverables. Every month, every quarter, every year.
Roadmap
- Multi-year technology strategy
- Tied to business goals, not vendor pitches
- Refreshed quarterly with your team
- Prioritized by risk and ROI
Budget
- 12-month rolling IT budget
- Capital vs. operating forecast
- Renewal calendar with negotiation dates
- Board-ready capex justifications
Vendor & risk
- Vendor selection & RFP support
- Renewal negotiation on your side
- Cyber-insurance & compliance oversight
- Vendor SLAs actually held to
Reporting
- Monthly executive dashboard
- Quarterly business review with leadership
- Board-ready risk & posture summaries
- Technology KPIs in your language
From "Advisor" to "Fully In the Room."
vCIO isn't consulting-by-the-hour. It's an operating relationship. Here's how we get to "trusted" faster than most execs believe is possible.
We learn your business first — the tech second.
Interviews with your leadership team, review of contracts and spend, walkthrough of current operations. Zero prescription until we understand the business we're advising.
- Executive interviews (CEO, CFO, Ops)
- Full contract & spend inventory
- Existing IT posture assessment
- Growth plan & risk map documented
We deliver a real roadmap and budget.
Not a slide deck of buzzwords. A written 12-month plan, a real budget with named line items, a renewal calendar, and a risk register you can defend to your board.
- 12-month rolling roadmap delivered
- IT budget with capex/opex split
- Renewal & negotiation calendar
- Risk register scored and prioritized
We become the seat you didn't have.
Monthly leadership sync, quarterly business review, vendor calls on your behalf, and — when the board asks — a technology story you're not scared to tell.
- First quarterly business review delivered
- Monthly executive dashboard live
- Vendor renewals actively managed
- Board packet reviewed and approved
Fractional Pricing. Full CIO Cadence.
A vCIO engagement is a monthly retainer, sized to the cadence and depth your business actually needs. Some clients want a full-time seat at 20 hours a month; others want a lighter touch with quarterly reviews.
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1. CadenceHow often we meet with leadership: monthly is baseline, weekly for growth or M&A phases, quarterly for steady-state.
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2. ScopeRoadmap + budget + reporting is the base. Add vendor negotiation, M&A due diligence, or compliance oversight as needed.
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3. StakesA funded growth company facing a Series B has different reporting needs than a stable 40-person firm. We match the depth.
vCIO vs. Full-Time CIO vs. "Ask the MSP"
Three ways to get technology strategy. Only one of them scales to the size of a 25–75 employee DFW business — and only one gives you Fortune-500 pedigree at SMB cost.
Ask Your MSP
- Ops-focused — not strategic
- Vendor incentive misalignment
- No board-level reporting
- No renewal negotiation muscle
- Roadmap = next vendor pitch
- No fiduciary accountability
vCIO — 48 Technologies
- Real 12-month rolling roadmap
- Board-ready reporting monthly
- Vendor negotiation on your side
- Cyber-insurance & compliance oversight
- Named accountable owner (Tom)
- Global-bank operating pedigree
Full-Time CIO Hire
- $200K–$300K + benefits & equity
- 12–18 months to full productivity
- One person's pedigree only
- Hiring risk in a tight DFW market
- Turnover: ~3 years
- Great — once you're 200+ people
I did the CIO job at scale. Now I do it fractionally — because a 40-person business deserves the same clarity a 40,000-person business gets.
Get a Real Seat at Your Own Table.
Book a 30-minute call — no pitch, just a conversation about what a vCIO engagement would look like for your business. Bring your CFO if you can.