Fractional COOCape TownWorking globally
Operations leadership from inside the business, built to run without me
I'm Cobus van Deventer, a fractional COO who trained and practised as a project manager. I step into the operation and keep it moving. At the same time, I work out what is really holding the business back: structure, process, people or technology. Then I build the operating model that fixes it and hand it to your team.
25 years
leading delivery in consulting engineering, IT and ventures
Up to 30
people led, with P&L, business development and key accounts
Multiple
international programmes held at once, across three continents
M.Eng
in project management, and a registered professional engineer
What I Do
Growing businesses rarely lack ideas. They lack the operational capacity to deliver them: work gets fragmented, systems stop fitting the business, and the CEO carries too much of the operation alone.
I take two things off the CEO's plate at once. I take accountability for the operation alongside your leaders, and I assess the business from inside it: operating model, structure, leadership capacity, processes, data and technology.
What I find becomes a prioritised improvement roadmap, which I then lead and deliver. It ends with an operating model the business owns and runs itself, not a report and not a dependency on me.
Where I Focus
Day-to-Day Operational Leadership
I work inside the operation, not beside it. I keep priorities moving, resolve the bottlenecks and cross-functional knots as they arise, make sure things get followed through and escalated, and turn the CEO's priorities into actions people can carry out.
Project & Programme Delivery
Trained in project management and practised in it for twenty-five years: scope, schedule, cost, risk and stakeholders. I rescue stalled or high-risk projects, set up PMOs, and run portfolios so the business works on fewer things and finishes them.
Operating Model & Organisational Design
Structure, roles, reporting lines and decision rights, assessed from inside the work rather than from a standalone review. I give the CEO an objective view of leadership capacity and key-person risk, and coach leaders as they take on clearer ownership.
Performance Visibility
An operating rhythm, KPIs and dashboards that show the CEO and the board what is happening, what is at risk and what was decided. I measure outcomes rather than activity, and keep it light enough that a busy team keeps using it.
Technology, Automation & AI
Assessing whether your systems still fit the business, then prioritising a practical technology roadmap: integration, automation of manual work, and AI where it improves productivity. I have built SaaS platforms of my own, led the team supporting and enhancing a learning platform, and know the build work well enough to lead the technical team that does it.
Commercial & Financial Management
P&L ownership, business development and key-account leadership. Making sure operations support sales, delivery and the customer experience, and that technology spending makes commercial sense.
Where the Experience Comes From
Twenty-five years of running delivery for other people: large teams, large programmes and real P&L. The operations work grew out of that.
Technical Director, Zutari
2016 – 2022
Led the international mechanical, fire and hydraulics team, holding delivery across multiple major programmes at once in Australia, the UAE and Saudi Arabia, across time zones, regulatory regimes and client cultures.
Project Manager to Director, Royal HaskoningDHV
2005 – 2016
Rose from project manager to director of a multidisciplinary business unit of up to 30 people, accountable for its P&L, market development and key accounts. Brought BIM and virtual design and construction into the unit, which changed how its whole delivery process worked.
Founder, Inokrate
2022 – present
Fractional operations leadership for growing businesses. Recent work includes restructuring a software delivery business into separate project and support teams, with defined roles, a documented delivery process and per-project profitability reporting.
- M.Eng, Project Management
- ·
- Management Development Programme, Tilburg
- ·
- Pr.Eng (ECSA)
- ·
- B.Eng Mechanical
How an Engagement Runs
I am leading inside the business from the first week. Behind that sits a six-stage playbook that decides what gets built and when, so order is added only where it earns its place, and the system ends up in your hands.
- 01
Orient
Understand the terrain and who really decides. No solutions yet.
- 02
Diagnose
See what's real, not what's reported. Narrow the noise to three to five core issues.
- 03
Stabilise
Stop the thrashing. Fewer things in motion, clearer priorities, calmer weeks.
- 04
Structure
Build the operating rhythm, ownership and reporting that make progress sustainable.
- 05
Embed
Hand the system over. Coach the owners, step back, let it be tested.
- 06
Exit or Evolve
Close cleanly or reshape the relationship on purpose. Never drift.
When I'm a Good Fit
- You need senior operations leadership, but not full-time
- The CEO carries too much of the operation alone
- A critical project or programme is under pressure
- Systems, data and reporting haven't kept up with growth
- You want an honest read on structure and leadership capacity
When I'm Not
- You want reports on the operation rather than changes to it
- You're after a large framework rollout for its own sake
- You want the problem held, not solved
- The appetite for change isn't really there yet
Next Steps
Start with a conversation, not a commitment.
If the operation needs senior leadership, or a critical piece of work is under pressure, a short conversation is usually enough to tell whether I can help. No solutions on the spot, no pressure.
Inokrate also takes on mechanical building-services engineering: see the engineering practice.