Switching Startups? How Fractional CTOs are Helping

The Great Resignation... The Tech Downturn...  ?

We're living in interesting (and oft challenging times) as software developers and tech startups go through some existential transitions and corrections that haven't been seen in a couple decades. For many, the downturn narrative and concerns around job stability are scary and anxiety inducing, especially if you have been impacted by the mass-layoffs to which many tech startups have resorted.

Observations From the Field

As operating Fractional CTOs (fCTOs) we have a unique vantage point, working with multiple startups spanning a range of industries and applications. Here are some of the things we're seeing:

1. Tech startups are still hiring as innovation and building has not ceased. These resilient startups are building in-demand applications, have interesting technical challenges to solve, and are working with modern tech stacks such as Elixir / Phoenix.  
2. Strong business fundamentals and market position along with a powerful financial base are some of the qualities that differentiate resilient startups from the ones that overhired in a VC-fueled growth-at-all-costs mindset.
3. While they say we're in a downturn and the socio & geopolitical outlook looks concerning, narrative cycles that used to span years, are now complete in the span of quarters. VCs are sitting on a mountain of cash that will eventually need to be deployed and the downturn "pain" has yet to get anywhere close to the dot com bomb days of Y2k.

Make Your Switch with the Help of a Fractional CTO

If you have been impacted by layoffs, are looking for a better working situation, or more interesting technical challenges to solve, working with a Fractional CTO can be a breath of fresh air when it comes to finding startup opportunities targeted to your experience, interests, and desired team culture.

To be clear, Fractional CTOs are not recruiters, yet we are regularly building engineering teams for our startup customers and are hiring talented software engineers. The advantages we bring to the hiring process:

• We are software engineers, with many years of technical and managerial experience operating in startups for which we're now advising and hiring. This experience allows us to easily identify very specific technical and cultural qualities of a candidate or startup.
• Our incentives are aligned with the success of our customers. We're looking to hire the right person for a given position or team based on their skills, personality, and experience. Since we will be working directly with the teams we build, it's in our interests to hire smart, decent human beings - ones we will enjoy working with on a daily basis.
• We are selective in our Fractional CTO engagements. We work with startups we find interesting, necessary, with a healthy culture, building a product we can believe in. If we wouldn't want to work there, why should you?
• Unique and innovative opportunities. Are you looking for an interesting tech stack? A startup that respects tech debt? Do you seek a very early stage ground-floor engineering position? Are you interested in progressive working arrangements (remote, async, four-day-workweek, multi-gigging, and others)? We work with startups that meet these criteria and embrace innovation both in the product and the organization.

Get in Touch

If this post resonates and you're a software engineer looking for a new (or improved) startup opportunity, get in touch at contact@fcto.io and we can discuss the open positions we're hiring for or refer you to other Fractional CTOs in our network.