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Ask HN: Best way to find a CTO?

8 points by curbenthusiasm ↗ HN
I am just curious as to what the best way to find a CTO is, considering an already built product developed through outsourcing? I am assuming they would prefer to see an already built product(check) with a decent amount of users and solid engagement(still to be done)... Do you think that's the case for people examining potential companies to work with as CTO? Let me hear your thoughts

14 comments

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dylanhassinger
yes, exactly

also having money to pay them

last but not least, before you get a CTO, get some good technical advisers. They can be your virtual CTO until you get a real one, and help you to vet candidates too.

curbenthusiasm
Hmm... what's the best place to meet technical advisors? Are these just friends, or would they want some form of compensation, assuming they just advice and don't have to stand in as CTO, maybe just do interviews...
bliti
I used to consult as a technical advisor (compensated). This is something that bigger companies use, but that smaller teams should look into. It provides insight into what the technology might look like or evolve into. A lot of times founders/engineers don't get the luxury of having someone more experience providing feedback. It never hurts, and usually helps discover issues that were not thought out. Issues that tend to be nails in the coffin.
tostitos1979
How do you advertise that you are interested in becoming a technical advisor? I see people ask for help at meet ups. I usually give them a few minutes of advice. Any resources to explain how to forge a proper advisor role?
karmajunkie
I function in this role for many of my clients.

1.) Definitely pay them. There's a lot of reasons for this, but most importantly, much like you pay a lawyer to be your most vocal and aggressive advocate, your virtual CTO is the person who has your company's back. His job is to provide you with good advice, vetting other technical staff and work, understand business climate and where your position is in the market, as well as augment your vision for your company.

2.) use them where its appropriate. The right person (or sometimes a firm) isn't going to be cheap—you're looking for the proverbial unicorn. Don't waste the budget having them work on perfecting CSS. When you have them working on code, have them build a foundation and show other team members how to leverage it. What you're paying for is their knowledge and experience. Have them review code, provide feedback, make sure you're getting your money's worth out of an outsourced team. Let them give you advice when you need it (and most importantly, take the advice! I can't tell you how many clients pay a lot of money for the advice then throw it out the window.)

3.) if you have a friend who can fill the role, that's great, but don't trust their technical skills just because they're a friend and will talk to you over beers. Advice is very much a get-what-you-pay-for kind of thing.

curbenthusiasm
Do you get paid hourly then as a virtual CTO? Also, what are the upsides of having a virtual cto versus an on-location guy?
karmajunkie
I usually bill hourly, but sometimes as a day rate, almost always with a retainer that we bill against.

Typically, having a full-time CTO is the "ideal" situation. For a company who can't afford a full-time CTO, however, having a virtual CTO means that they get access wealth of experience that they'd otherwise never be able to afford. A startup who's business is based on technology in any meaningful way absolutely needs someone to fill that role—you can't (or shouldn't) just trust that a run-of-the-mill contractor is going to deliver what you think you're getting, and you probably aren't qualified to determine whether they are or not. This is the main reason outsourced projects end badly. Having a virtual CTO isn't as good as having a technical cofounder, but its a damn sight better than having no technical members on the team at all.

hkarthik
I would advise finding some local meetups for startup-focused technologies (Ruby, Python, Javascript) and look there.

If you can find a local community for startups too, I would advise going to the meetups and see who's interested. You may even find the CTO you're looking for there.

debt
I think money is probably the number one request. Any good CTO isn't too concerned with the state of the product as long it's not in total disarray.

So the question should be do you have enough money to pay a decent salary for a CTO? Then you should ask, is it a product that would benefit from a CTO?

rmtutty
What do you want from a CTO? As a serial CTO/lead dev/architect-y guy, I can tell you that the title can be extremely varied in interest and actual duties.

Are you looking for someone to select the tools and the way those tools work together to meet your goals? Then they might not want to see an already built product.

Are you looking for someone to help you scale the application as engagement (hopefully) goes through the roof? You may be looking for more of a devops person.

Are you looking for someone to set up the developer culture, the process and hire/mentor an internal team? A good lead developer can handle these issues.

Are you looking for someone to which to hand ALL of these issues, to just handle them? Then, you are actually looking for a CTO. This person will be more expensive than the others, and will likely drive additional expenses through hiring those others as well. So consider your MVT (minimum viable team) as well as MVP, and go looking for the people you really need.

Best of luck!

curbenthusiasm
> Are you looking for someone to select the tools and the way those tools work together to meet your goals? Then they might not want to see an already built product.

That pretty much nails it for me... So, if that's the case, what do you think my best course of action would be to find a dev ops guy?

hkarthik
This is an awesome response. +1000
aosmith
I've been a CTO a couple times, under similar circumstances. My candid thoughts are:

- A legacy code base from an offshore team can be a blessing or a curse.

- How's your cash flow situation? Remember your perspective CTO is probably being offered 6/7 figures elsewhere.

- Tightly related to the above, what is your CPA? What about LTV? How do those numbers compare? Are you making money or loosing money on every user?

You're welcome to shoot me an email... <hn username>@gmail.com.

rush-tea
Rather than employ the candidate with salary and minimum stock, why don't ask him to join as a co founder with decent share? With that, you will have someone who can own up as his share value and wealth also depends on his performance.