Nobody Ever Told You a Fractional CTO Was an Option

Ever wonder why nobody ever mentioned fractional CTOs to you? Follow the money on the advice you’ve been getting.

Your agency earns more when the answer to every problem is a bigger contract. A recruiter earns a percentage of a full-time salary, so their advice will always be a full-time hire. Your freelancer bills by the hour, and “you need senior oversight I can’t provide” is not a sentence that increases their hours. None of them are lying to you. They just answer every question with the thing they sell.

Even the founders in your network can’t help much here. They repeat whatever they did, which was usually hiring big or going without, because those were the only options anyone ever showed them.

Fractional CFOs took decades to become normal for the same reason. The people selling finance recruiting and accounting services had no reason to bring up a smaller alternative. It spread founder to founder, from the ones who tried it and kept their runway.

So I’m bringing it up. Senior technical leadership comes in the size you actually need, from people who have run technology organizations before. And yes, I offer exactly that, which means I have the same incentive problem as everyone else on this list. Weigh my advice the way you’d weigh theirs.

Agencies and full-time CTOs both have their place. I work alongside agencies on client engagements today. Just add the third option to your list before the next expensive decision.

Think about the last piece of technical advice you got. What was the person who gave it selling?

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