A fractional CTO is a senior technical leader who works with you on a retainer — not a freelance developer you ping when something is on fire, and not an agency account director translating between you and a bench. The job is decisions: what to build, what to stop, whom to hire, which vendor is lying, and whether the architecture will survive the next eighteen months.
What the role actually covers
- A written product and technical sequence, revisited monthly.
- Hiring and vendor scoreboards so you are not the only person who can tell good work from theater.
- Operating cadence: reviews, release discipline, the Friday demo that keeps everyone honest.
- Hands-on spikes when a memo is not enough.
It does not cover “being on call for WordPress” or attending every standup as a mascot. If you need tickets closed, hire an engineer. If you need a grown-up in the room with the founder, hire the seat.
Signals it is time
The contractor build is late and nobody can explain the repo. The site converts until it does not, and the person who built it is gone. You are about to spend real money on an AI initiative and the only internal owner is “whoever watched the demo.” You are raising or just raised and the board asked who owns technology. You shipped v1 and the next decisions are organizational, not just features.
Fractional vs. agency vs. full-time
An agency sells a project. A full-time CTO sells a career. Fractional sits in the gap: weekly, accountable, cheaper than an executive search, more senior than a mid-level hire you hope will grow into the job. Some companies stay fractional for years. Others use it as a bridge to a VP of Engineering — with a clean scoreboard instead of folklore.
Enterprise rigor, startup pace. The Microsoft years show up as judgment, not as a process religion.
We offer the seat from Camano Island, Washington, usually after a scoped build or a two-week discovery. Read the fractional CTO practice or send a brief via contact.
Continue in the practice: related service.