How can you ensure you hire the right CTO for your business?
Mark Ridley, founder of CTO advisory practice Ridley Industries, explains that the right type of CTO depends on your business and the skills gaps amongst your other technology leaders
Technology leaders are under more pressure than ever, with organisations now totally dependent on IT as most staff continue to work remotely.
Many businesses hire a CTO to take on some of the burden of technology leadership. Mark Ridley, founder of CTO advisory practice Ridley Industries previously talked to Computing about what makes a great CTO, and when organisations might need one.
Once an organisation has decided to recruit a CTO, how should it go about understand what type of CTO it needs?
"It's important to understand what your business needs from the CTO, as there are different types," Ridley begins. "It's worth trying to undertsand your requirements so you can match them to the CTO you're hiring. Look at whether you're a deep technology company, whether you need to look at machine learning, are you in a heavily regulated industry? Those each bring different perspectives which your CTO will need to be strong in.
"And then you need to look at your existing team. If you have a really strong head of technology the CTO can lean on them. You might need a steady state CTO, someone that will organically grow with the business, or a transformational CTO. But understand that someone who's good at transformation won't want to move onto being the steady state CTO afterwards."
He adds that once an organisation has come to that understanding, then recruitment can happen in a fairly normal fashion.
"If you can hire internally then go there first, if not look externally. Sometimes it's worth going externally so you bring in greater diversity or new skills. Start with your network, or looking for professional recommendations."
If that doesn't turn up the right level of candidates, then Ridley argues that using headhunters can be beneficial.
"I'd also recommend working with a headhunter as they can reach into candidates who aren't actively seeking roles. Engaging a headhunter means you can start building archetypes of who you want; I want Satya Nadella, can you find people like him? Or I want someone like the CTO at Spotify but I can't afford him, so please look into the CTO minus one level at Spotify. Or look into a lookalike business, look at the CTO and then their direct reports."
Ridley also has some tips for the interview process.
"The recruitment process needs to be fair and transparent all the way through, following best practise like blind CVs; recruiters shouldn't know the gender or ethnicity of candidates. Then make the interview process as similar as possible to the job itself. You don't want to hire someone who's good at interviewing, but good at the job. If possible hire them for a trial shift, like hairdressers do. Think of assessment centres where they put candidates in situations similar to tthose hey'll find on the job.
"A trial shift can be hard for a CTO role, but it's worth it if you figure it out."