I have played / playing CTO for multiple startups spanning over 6 years with a total experience of over 20+ years.
I am fairly successful (!?) (though the perspective is my own and satisfied with the mix of life I'm into and whatever I'm!) in my career and have enjoyed a good and competent technical team with me all the time.
I mentor my team mostly from ground-up and have found that anyone can become a fantastic and a dependable competent resource provided enough freedom and directions. Also worked as a startup coach. Been into startups since early 2000s
Obviously, this handle is my pseudonym and not my real name. Extremely sorry for that as I value privacy more than anything and people call me that I'm a paranoid. I'm still not in a position to divulge much personally.
I'll try to list down common issues faced and lessons learnt by startup a CTO as much possible.
- Having to deal with a non-technical founder is very hard
- Technical work could be very challenging if you are one of the few who takes cares of many things or try to play multiple roles
- Getting competent resources could prove to be a very tough task if you are in a third world country. (I'm not talking about the Bay Area types)
- Have a process right from day one. Do everything in a documented manner and work like what will happen if you get run over by a truck (it could happen to anyone on the team). Then what?
- Technical stack identification for an initial MVP will take time until one gets it right considering a 360 degree view covering all the aspects
- Having business knowledge / outlook is a must and without that, however technical one could be, he/she will not bring value on a long run. There could always be a better one who will replace you
- Strike the deal from the day one. There is no free lunch. Negotiate hard and properly for what you are worth. No slack or compromise on those aspects
- There are no shortcuts for anything
- Everyday is a learning day
- There are newer ways of doing things which gets into the mainstream and some might even come from you!
- Keeping the team together and motivated is an extremely tough thing to do if you are in a non-commercial decision making role. Try to vest some powers towards that direction if you are joining a team (not as a part of core founding / decision making team, but just playing a CTO / VP of Tech or something akin to it)
- Pleasing everyone is not possible all the time. Learn to cope with frustrations and take decisions based on long term goals
- Never get driven by emotions
- Be ready to adopt to any situation, and be adept at many things. Learn, learn and learn and put to use
- Have a birds eye view on everything and have the vision of an ant on specifics (up close!)
There is much more to write (it's my part time passion and mostly use it for internal communications, mentoring and teaching), but seriously considering it towards a book of experience in (near?) future.
Though the above is incomplete in many ways, would like to hear the thoughts / views from other technical people. Thanks for reading so far!
I am fairly successful (!?) (though the perspective is my own and satisfied with the mix of life I'm into and whatever I'm!) in my career and have enjoyed a good and competent technical team with me all the time.
I mentor my team mostly from ground-up and have found that anyone can become a fantastic and a dependable competent resource provided enough freedom and directions. Also worked as a startup coach. Been into startups since early 2000s
Obviously, this handle is my pseudonym and not my real name. Extremely sorry for that as I value privacy more than anything and people call me that I'm a paranoid. I'm still not in a position to divulge much personally.
I'll try to list down common issues faced and lessons learnt by startup a CTO as much possible.
- Having to deal with a non-technical founder is very hard
- Technical work could be very challenging if you are one of the few who takes cares of many things or try to play multiple roles
- Getting competent resources could prove to be a very tough task if you are in a third world country. (I'm not talking about the Bay Area types)
- Have a process right from day one. Do everything in a documented manner and work like what will happen if you get run over by a truck (it could happen to anyone on the team). Then what?
- Technical stack identification for an initial MVP will take time until one gets it right considering a 360 degree view covering all the aspects
- Having business knowledge / outlook is a must and without that, however technical one could be, he/she will not bring value on a long run. There could always be a better one who will replace you
- Strike the deal from the day one. There is no free lunch. Negotiate hard and properly for what you are worth. No slack or compromise on those aspects
- There are no shortcuts for anything
- Everyday is a learning day
- There are newer ways of doing things which gets into the mainstream and some might even come from you!
- Keeping the team together and motivated is an extremely tough thing to do if you are in a non-commercial decision making role. Try to vest some powers towards that direction if you are joining a team (not as a part of core founding / decision making team, but just playing a CTO / VP of Tech or something akin to it)
- Pleasing everyone is not possible all the time. Learn to cope with frustrations and take decisions based on long term goals
- Never get driven by emotions
- Be ready to adopt to any situation, and be adept at many things. Learn, learn and learn and put to use
- Have a birds eye view on everything and have the vision of an ant on specifics (up close!)
There is much more to write (it's my part time passion and mostly use it for internal communications, mentoring and teaching), but seriously considering it towards a book of experience in (near?) future.
Though the above is incomplete in many ways, would like to hear the thoughts / views from other technical people. Thanks for reading so far!