I’ve been having discussions with several people recently about the role of the CTO (Chief Technology Officer) in very early stage companies. That’s why Roger Smith puts the focus of the CTO on programming for the earliest stage. What worries me a bit is how often I read that startups should hire a developer / hands-on lead developer. But often the result of a Founder hiring a developer or lead developer or even a VP engineering In December 2007, I described how I commonly take on an Acting CTO Role in a Start-up . I used an image from Roger Smith that

Just saw a great post by Mark Geller - Developers wanted… in Los Angeles, U.S.A. (you can get to know Mark a bit more in my post Product Manager Entrepreneur Mark Geller ). Mark tells us: there is a lot of demand for developers right here in L.A. who would love to talk with you. There’s quite a bit of truth to what Mark is saying about startup software developers, but my guess is that If you have solid web skills and a few years experience, either with a commercial company or running your own legit projects, there are dozens of companies in L.A. reduced salary,

It soaked up all of our development resources and didn’t allow us to focus on what we felt our company strategy was. note: my internal friends at Salesforce tell me that they’ve really fixed this now and internal dev teams are much more focused on bigger, more strategic development). Deer are not so big that they can make huge demands on you for your development resources or customer support.  They This post is part of my series “ Startup Lessons ” Elephants, Deer and Rabbits – Some thoughts on start-up segmentation

At your stage of development do you really think a shit-hot VP Sales is going to join you to head up sales?  Tags: Start-up Advice startup technolog Only Hire A+ People Who Punch Above Their Weight Class This is part of my ongoing posts on  Startup Advice .  There are people who tell startups that they should hire the most senior people that they can find. 

Is your business’s success going to be based on execution or technology?  Or Back in the dot-com days, competitive advantage was largely based on technology development.  For In fact, thanks to Amazon Web Services, products can be launched without the developers ever having to purchase, lease, or touch servers.  Databases, Or is it something in between? For example, if you wanted to build an e-commerce site in 1996, it was really hard!  Any efficiencies

This is a private group of CTOs who are responsible for software development within their companies. They are generally the senior most person responsible for custom software development, database design, database administration, web development, etc. In a recent conversation with a fellow CTO, we lamented about the fact that while there's very active software development and web development going on in Southern California and West Los Angeles, yet there didn't seem to be as much of a community around it. I've helped organize the Los Angeles CTO Forum for almost 10 years.

That died with waterfall software development.  Do you really want to spent $100k building a product to discover through Customer Development that the market is too small? Tags: Startup Advice startup technology vc venture capita This is part of my ongoing series of posts and I need to file this one under both Raising Venture Capital and Startup Advice . I

I’ve worked with 30+ early-stage companies in all sorts of capacities (and spoken to many, many more), so I thought it might be worthwhile trying to classify the various ways that I’ve engaged in different technology roles in startups. Background This post partly really came about as a result of a great conversation yesterday with David Croslin a former CTO at HP who recently conducted an interesting experiment. He posted on several social networking sites the following message: If you know of a startup company that could benefit from the knowledge, experience, professional

But I would argue that you can develop relationships with many advisers, mentors and VCs that will help with introductions for no equity.  Tags: Start-up Advice startup technology vc venture capita This is part of my ongoing series Startup Advice .  Many startup companies hire advisory boards.  It’s very tempting. 

Traction can simply mean showing that you’re making progress with customers, product development, channel partners, initial revenue as a proof point, attracting well-known angel investors, winning industry awards / recognition.  Funding is about developing a relationship over time.  Tags: Pitching VCs Start-up Advice startup technology This is part of my ongoing series “Pitching a VC” – the outline is here . You’ve pitched several angels and VC’s.