Most companies get this wrong when hiring a CTO

They hire highly technical, perhaps even world leading experts in their narrow field of technology, instead of hiring as CTO a business strategist with broader technical expertise in that industry.

I’ll explain:

The CTO sets the direction for the technical strategy to achieve the business strategy.

If you hire a CTO that’s a world leader in X technology, they’re likely hyper focused on that, but have no strategic view of how this technology can serve the business.

A strategic CTO can always hire subject matter experts (and give them fancy titles like Chief Science Officer or Chief Nanoparticles Engineer, or Chief Robotics Engineer) and harness their exceptional technical talent for the company’s technology strategy.

Instead, companies hire a highly technical CTO and then are disappointed when this technical expert is not strategic.

This technical expert became an expert because they focused their life’s work on this technology.

They didn’t focus their life’s work on business tech strategy in your industry.

You need a CTO who understands business first, and technology second.

Otherwise, you’ll find yourself spending incredible amounts of money on doing engineering work (as well as pet projects) which are not strategic, and therefore are not focused on bringing real value to the business.

Challenge me if you think I’m mistaken. I’m absolutely open for debate!

What kind of CTO should companies be recruiting?

#cto #ceo #recruitment #reengineeringleadership