A New Use Case for Fractional: Government and Community Relations 

About the Author: Mason Smith is a government and community relations expert. He's been a leader for numerous industry-defining companies, including Airbnb (YC W09), GM Cruise (YC W14), and Hipcamp (Andressen Horowitz, Index Ventures, Benchmark Capital, Bond Capital). 

In 2014, he led a team to legalize Airbnb in their hometown of San Francisco. From 2018, he paved the way to launch electric autonomous vehicles in California during the industry's pre-commercial era. Most recently, he founded and led the global government relations department at Hipcamp.

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Regulations and Product Market Fit

With fractional hires you’re able to access top tier talent at the scale you need when you need it — without a long term or expensive commitment to a full time hire. Finance, marketing, engineering, and design are obvious choices for fractional roles. They are universally understood and every company needs them. 

But unless you’re planning to stay in stealth forever, your real-world business also needs to comply with real-world regulations (or navigate a landscape where these rules don’t yet exist). A fractional government relations person can be your right-sized solution to build a foundation of public sector support and craft your regulatory strategy as you pursue product market fit (PMF).

Customers are the most critical players when determining PMF, but ignoring regulators and policymakers puts you on the fast track to a world of legal and reputational headache. Instead, consider the public sector a key stakeholder within the market as you’re defining your product.

Ask yourself the same questions to test PMF but through the lens of the public sector: “would 40% of regulators be “very disappointed” if they or their community could no longer use my product? Would regulators recommend my product to their colleagues?” If it’s not a “yes” it’s time to invest. 

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What is government relations and what does a government relations person do?

A government relations person serves as the bridge between your business and the public sector. The public sector includes government departments or agencies and elected or appointed officials who represent the people — all of the people. Your startup has much narrower interests: your customers. 

But it’s critically important to align your specific interests with the broader public prerogative. Building a startup with only your customers in mind is like reading every other chapter in a book — you’re simply not getting the full story. 

A government relations person can help you understand, be a part of, and even shape regulations as or even before they’re written. Consider them the owner of your public sector roadmap. For early stage startups, a good government relations person can help you: 

• Define company policy. Regulators and their constituents need to understand what they can expect from your business. A government relations person knows what regulators care most about and can inform company policies to reflect that. They’re the trained voice of the public sector in product meetings.   
• Articulate the company’s position on public policy. A government relations person can help you understand how existing and future regulations apply and can help the business make informed decisions on whether and how to engage with these regulations. Don’t raise your hand to be regulated too early, but don’t try to fly under the radar for too long — a savvy assessment will identify the right move at the right time. 
• Shape the policy landscape: A government relations person will identify the power brokers relevant to you. They may not know every key external stakeholder in each of your launch markets, but they can help you find your way into the right room and prepare you to show up appropriately.  

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What’s the value for early stage startups? 

Every dollar is precious, especially in those early years, so most startups could only dream of tapping into this type of specialized talent so early in their journey. But fractional makes it possible. 

Here are three essential wins that you can expect from a fractional government and community relations leader:  

• Operate with full visibility: convert a share of the “unknown unknowns” into “known unknowns” and ultimately “known knowns”. Moving through this funnel will help you make increasingly clear-eyed decisions to rapidly and healthily grow the business far into the future.

“Unknown unknown”: you’re not even aware that regulations could derail your business. You’ve essentially buried your head in the sand on this one. 

“Known unknown”: you know that a new regulation will be introduced, but you are not yet sure of its details. There’s some uncertainty still, but you’re aware of it, so you can prepare by starting your research now.

“Known knowns”: you know what’s in the new regulations, you’ve defined your company position on it, and you’ve created a plan to tackle it. 

• Ensure your competitive advantage: only if you’re aware of the regulatory landscape can you shape it to your advantage. You may also choose to pivot in response to changes in the regulatory landscape. 

The world of autonomous vehicles (AVs) offer a good example: generally speaking, California incentivizes EVs, including electric AVs (EV/AVs). If you plan to have a fleet of EV/AVs, you’re likely advocating for additional EV incentives. If you plan to have an AV fleet with some EVs and some gas burning cars, you’re stuck either advocating against the stream of EV incentives or choosing to introduce more EVs into your fleet. 

• Secure social license to operate: this refers to the community’s acceptance of your operations. This is the work that’s done to win over folks who are on the fence about your product or to assuage people who think they could be negatively impacted by your business. Social license ensures your ability to launch and scale with limited impact on your timeline or reputation. 

Airbnb had fantastic marketing from its early days but it was the government relations people who won over hosts’ neighbors and their city council representatives who were upset about neighborhood “party houses”. This isn’t communications and it’s not marketing.

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You probably can't afford a full time government relations person. That’s fine, start fractionally — now.

You can’t, and really shouldn’t, invest in a full time government relations hire before PMF. Historically, you may have had to choose between breaking the bank on an FTE and running your business without a regulatory strategy. But with a fractional leader even the earliest stage startups can access high-level, à la carte expertise at a fraction of the cost. 

Your fractional government relations person is probably not drafting model regulations at this stage, but in 5-10 hours a week they could do a risk assessment to flesh out what regulations your launch, pivot, or new feature could trigger. They could also build out your external messaging for a really specific audience or map out the universe of critical public sector stakeholders. They could work their networks to secure high leverage meetings for you and prepare you for these and other main-stage thought leadership opportunities. 

The public sector is continually creating or revising rules. Autonomous vehicles, short term rentals, ride sharing, and of course AI — none of these industries existed in a commercially meaningful way fifteen years ago. So of course there weren’t suitable rules for these industries. 

Any startup in any emerging industry is a great candidate for fractional government relations support: AI, climate tech, IoT, smart cities, blockchain and web3, autonomous vehicles. Even more mature industries like digital media, car rentals, ride sharing, customer relationship management, and micro mobility could benefit from a fractional leader.

Any company using AI should leverage a fractional hire to parse through the flood of state legislation that’s actively defining this emerging industry. A climate tech company could use a fractional leader to help secure necessary permits and win community approval as they move from lab tests to field studies. A fractional leader could also interpret the patchwork of state and local regulations for any peer to peer marketplace (e.g. in-home chefs, sports lessons, camping, etc.) as they prepare to launch or grow markets. 

The use cases for fractional government relations leaders are sky high. It hasn’t always been the case, but today’s startups have access to top tier talent from this niche and critically important world. Leverage this to transform regulatory headwinds into your competitive advantage by incorporating the public sector perspective into your quest as you define your product offering. 

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Policy change takes years, plant the seeds today. 

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I’m Mason, a government and community relations expert. I’ve led government and community relations teams at industry-defining companies like Airbnb, GM Cruise, and Hipcamp. I’m currently offering my services as a fractional leader. Reach out at masonglennsmith@gmail.com if you think I can be of help!

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‍And if you’re looking to hire a fractional leader across one of 10+ different function areas, that’s what Fractional Jobs is for (the site you’re reading this on). Feel free to get in touch at hello@fractionaljobs.io