When a fractional CTO makes sense
A fractional CTO makes sense when your engineering needs a leader before your company needs a full-time one.
Does it sound like this?
- “We have engineers. Nobody is setting the bar.”
- “We need someone senior in the room, not a report about it.”
- “We can’t justify a full-time engineering leader yet.”
- “We want it built right the first time, not audited later.”
- “I don’t want to need someone like this forever.”
Then you need engineering led a day or two a week, to
Set the bar, and make it hold
I decide what the work has to clear before it ships, and the reviews and checks that keep it clearing. The standard stops depending on who happens to be reviewing that day.
Make the decisions inside your team
I read your code and guide your team through the architecture, the trade-offs and the sequencing, deciding those with them rather than in a report they read later.
Enable your team to run it themselves
The conventions, the review gates and the reasoning behind them are all built with your team, and they can keep it running, with or without me.
If your engineering needs leading and it isn’t time to hire for it, tell me where the team is and what you’re trying to reach.
If the answer turns out to be a full-time hire, that’s here.