What are CTO roles and responsibilities in a startup?

Role of CTO in a startup

By definition, CTO or chief technology officer handles technology or engineering teams, develops, executes strategic business plans and identifies the resources you need in order to build a product.

Whether you need CTO or not depends on the type of product you are developing. If your startup idea is based on a high-tech product, you need one and if your product is more into Saas’ side, you may not.

CTO Type	CTO Role	Startup Size
Operational Director	Focuses on the business aspect of the technology stack. He has skills like finance administration, project management, business analyzing	Medium to established setup
Technical Lead	Technical background, responsible for solution architecture and team management	Any size
Product Owners	Completely familiar with the product, market and the end user, assess data and build features	Small size

When should you hire a CTO in a startup?

Ideal time for hiring CTO varies. Like we said, it depends on the product type. Second, as the startup evolves, its challenges and needs change and so does the role and requirement of a CTO.

Hiring CTO in a startup isn’t for the latter part, you have to induct the CTO as early as possible especially if your product type demands. Although depending upon many factors, you think of whether your startup needs a CTO now or not. If you can afford, we advise having him as he will help in making key technical decisions.

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CTO responsibilities in a startup

CTO responsibilities are more or less the same except for the fact that difference lies in the role they are playing in the startup.

Operational director/manager – manages processes and resources, build company strategies, face of company, suggests multiple solutions

Technical lead – builds mvps, hires software developers and team, guides team about strategic plans, improves on app architecture.

Product owners – upscale the product on every stage, advise on new engaging features based on market research.

CTO responsibility area	How to accomplish?
Engineering	Solution architecture / system infrastructure to ensure functionality and efficiency
Strategy	Strategize each and every stage of a startup/business
Product	What features should be part of the product given market research
Business Technology	Helps startup run its business and operational processes, can-be customer-facing apps and solutions
Data	Big data and product lifecycle
Domain Knowledge	Must be aware of the product genre, if technical he must have the skillset
Commercial/business model	Commercial plan for a startup is necessary or at least he knows how startup will penetrate in the competitive market
Team building	Hire resources and manages large team

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Challenges faced by CTO

To be honest, getting a CTO with all above qualities is hard to find due to exponential demand in the software industry.

However, we can list challenges you could face while looking for your perfect CTO.

Tracking performance to main productivity of the team
Lacks innovation, may be good at developing a product but don’t know how to scale a product
Finding and hiring qualified tech professionals
Developing technical strategy that will make vision a reality
Risk analysis
Investors or sources of capital scrutinize leadership especially CTO

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Core skills every CTO must possess

Although we have mentioned the skills required in a CTO, here are some of the important skills.

Sound understanding of the business functions, challenges it may face and solutions to overcome
Leadership, he typically works with teams and ensures high productivity by motivating the team.
A good communicator, able to communicate with all business stakeholders includes business ideas, technical information and solutions.
Decision making, CTO has to make important decisions like hiring resources, assigning tasks, meeting deadlines.
Market research, someone with an analytical mind, notices customer behaviors.
Critical thinking skills, someone who is open minded and can do analysis, interpretation, inference, and has great problem-solving skills.
Time management – solid and timely product delivery in every phase, responsible for assigning tasks and setting deadlines.

Where to find a technical cofounder or CTO?

Final verdict

Can’t find a capable and reliable CTO? Start with your network and spread the word. We believe not just the skills but trustworthiness is another core thing to consider while hiring CTO for a startup.

Startup is a risky business. With an entrepreneurial mission, around 90% startups fail but often a great leadership leads to success. Role of CTO is vital in any startup since he looks into technical-related issues and makes sure the company’s product is solving the end-user problems. After looking into the CTO roles and responsibilities, you must be thinking ‘it’s huge’, that is the reason why they draw over $140,000 / year in the US (Indeed).

Finding the right CTO may take months, also it’s rare that CTO evolves with the development of the product, consider Phaedra Solutions as your technology partner.