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Why I code as a CTO

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Re: Why I code as a CTO

#91

Post by citizenpaul »

willio58 wrote: post #10

> I currently manage no direct reports and ship a lot of code. This is a wildly different status than almost all other people with this title. I’m glad this person still likes coding, and they seem to be great at it, but this role doesn’t match up to the title. This doesn’t really matter until he wants to switch jobs and realizes near zero CTO positions outside of this one company will require few meetings and zero m…

Not much is worse than working somewhere that a higher up is squatting a job title that they don't want to do. It just causes a dysfunctional lord of the flies situation where lower people fight for the reigns to get what they want.

Re: Why I code as a CTO

#92

Post by CuriouslyC »

prerok wrote: post #84
dilyevsky wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's something you're willing to share out loud? Your company's technical process (which you're fully in control of, Mr. CTO) is so cumbersome that it seriously hinders your ability to execute This is exactly what someone who can't be easily unseated should be doing at a company - demonstrate to middle management that the process they've constructed is whack and take away excuses for not delivering. CEO or someon…

Trouble is, I don't think they'll just get it and then set about to changing the processes. Besides, the process doesn't come from the middle management, it originates from the top, usually the CTO.

Unless you're at a very small company, CTOs set technical vision, choose high level tooling strategy and outline engineering culture in broad strokes, but the nitty gritty of process will be from an engineering director or other role below the CTO. The CTO will probably provide feedback if needed, but they're not in the weeds and won't be able to see problems unless they're raised.

Re: Why I code as a CTO

#93

Post by CuriouslyC »

OccamsMirror wrote: post #83
dilyevsky wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That's something you're willing to share out loud? Your company's technical process (which you're fully in control of, Mr. CTO) is so cumbersome that it seriously hinders your ability to execute This is exactly what someone who can't be easily unseated should be doing at a company - demonstrate to middle management that the process they've constructed is whack and take away excuses for not delivering. CEO or someon…

Cowboy development might fly in an early stage startup. But are you even really a CTO or are you just an overpaid mid-level developer?

Just this. CTO title doesn't even make sense until your org is large enough that engineering vision and strategy becomes decoupled from execution.

Re: Why I code as a CTO

#94

Post by CuriouslyC »

mobeigi wrote: post #80

I appreciated the sentiment but I do wonder how on earth a CTO has enough time to write one line of code, let along several thousands. Even before reaching the C-suite roles, higher ups tend to be in meetings all day, back to back. In the short amount of non-meeting time they find, they typically have to do other admin related things or information sharing. I guess that CTO uses weekends or works super long hours whi…

While I think CTOs should take steps back from pushing to production systems because there's a lot of I dotting and T crossing that needs to happen with production systems that CTOs don't reasonably have time for, if a CTO wasn't writing experiments and building test systems to determine technical direction, or at least getting their hands dirty with said systems produced by their top principles, I wouldn't trust their judgment to set direction.

Re: Why I code as a CTO

#95

Post by re-lre-l »

kittikitti wrote: post #72

The amount of commentators that downright oppose and ridicule a CTO coding is why enshittification is so pervasive. If a CTO understands the codebase to the point where they can contribute to it, I presume that's a good thing. I sense so much fear of actual engineering and technology in the comments and it really highlights why startups are failing to innovate and create compelling products.

Hell yeah. I was honestly pretty surprised by this reaction here. On one hand, I can agree with the argument about focusing on strategy rather than coding — it makes sense. But on the other hand, I’m personally so tired of all this management bullshit out there, where the higher-ups have no idea about even the high-level technical abstractions of what’s going on under the hood in the projects they’re leading. Just imagine the level of incompetence when a Staff Engineer can mislead a Project Owner about the complexity of implementing simple pagination — and the POs and PMs are totally fine with it, like, “let’s just postpone it.” Hell yeah.

Re: Why I code as a CTO

#96

Post by prerok »

CuriouslyC wrote: post #92
prerok wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trouble is, I don't think they'll just get it and then set about to changing the processes. Besides, the process doesn't come from the middle management, it originates from the top, usually the CTO.

Unless you're at a very small company, CTOs set technical vision, choose high level tooling strategy and outline engineering culture in broad strokes, but the nitty gritty of process will be from an engineering director or other role below the CTO. The CTO will probably provide feedback if needed, but they're not in the weeds and won't be able to see problems unless they're raised.

You are correct, my post was more for the situation where the CTO is also the engineering director but in larger orgs that is not usually so.

I do think, however, that the coding CTO is not the way to go about to change the process. If it's too cumbersome, the CTO should talk with engineering director to find a way to make it less so, not just bypass the process.

Re: Why I code as a CTO

#97

Post by lbreakjai »

tptacek wrote: post #5

Articles like these are kind of hard to parse because there's no well-defined meaning to the title of "CTO". Our "CTO" codes, probably more than anybody in the company, but that's because he's got a founder-inherited CTO title that mostly just means "he can do whatever he wants" --- we're happy with that, what he wants is practically always great. That's one definition of a CTO. Another CTO type is the opposite: "the…

I once worked for company with C-level guys working alongside the rank and file. Smartest guys I knew, EE degrees with honours from Cambridge. So smart that they knew their strength, and decided to let better people manage the company they created.

Re: Why I code as a CTO

#98

Post by wiseowise »

dilyevsky wrote: post #76
CobrastanJorji wrote: post #67

Man, if I'm trying to decide which company to work for, and I see a blog post from its CTO crowing about regularly checking in code on Saturdays and Sundays, I'd start backing slowly away. And when I got to the bit that said "AI has made me three times as productive," I'd turn and run. Your job at the top is, more than anything else, pushing down a healthy culture. That includes things like setting an example of not…

> That's something you're willing to share out loud? Your company's technical process (which you're fully in control of, Mr. CTO) is so cumbersome that it seriously hinders your ability to execute This is exactly what someone who can't be easily unseated should be doing at a company - demonstrate to middle management that the process they've constructed is whack and take away excuses for not delivering. CEO or someon…

You need to exercise your god given right to mog goons below you.

Show everyone that system (that you’ve created) is shit and when some lowly SE thinks he’s above them all, you publicly flay him and make example for all that you’re the god emperor.

Business value? The ego trip is a business value!

Re: Why I code as a CTO

#99

Post by brabel »

stuffn wrote: post #90
CobrastanJorji wrote: post #67

Man, if I'm trying to decide which company to work for, and I see a blog post from its CTO crowing about regularly checking in code on Saturdays and Sundays, I'd start backing slowly away. And when I got to the bit that said "AI has made me three times as productive," I'd turn and run. Your job at the top is, more than anything else, pushing down a healthy culture. That includes things like setting an example of not…

Frankly if you’re a CTO you aren’t incentivized by a salary. It makes sense in this case no different than you’d code on the weekends for your side hustle. It only doesn’t make sense when this jackass thinks the salaried engineer needs this “grit”. C-levels aren’t supposed to be “model employees”. The incentive structure is wildly weighted in their favor. Instead you should ask them to understand the difference, whic…

So in your view c-level are all sociopaths? Let me guess you are not c-level. Or maybe you are but you’re the exception to the rule.

Re: Why I code as a CTO

#100

Post by liqilin1567 »

29athrowaway wrote: post #2

You can be the chief officer of a 1 person organization, or a 100,000 organization. Or pick another dimension such as SLOC, number of projects/products, teams, DAU, etc. CTO has a different meaning at different levels of scale. With a headcount of around 250 employees, you can still work directly on implementation. But with a headcount of 100,000, it doesn't make sense.

I agree. As a company grows, the CTO must shift from coder to leader, architect, and culture-shaper.
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