SaaStr

FEBRUARY 22, 2023

Many companies believe excellent product design comes from hiring the best engineers and signing up for the latest software instead of building from the users’ perspectives. Stripe’s CTO, David Singleton, shares how they use a system of feedback, iteration, and fast shipping to create products that meet users’ expectations.

CTO Hire 224

CTO Hire CTO Payment Methods Payment Solutions 224

Crafty CTO

FEBRUARY 7, 2023

I’ve learned so much … most importantly, I think, that I love being a fractional CTO, a role that allows me to make use of everything I’ve learned and experienced over a long technology-focused career. What’s changing, rather, is the entity I’m delivering through – a new company called Crafty CTO.

CTO Hire 40

CTO Hire New CTO CTO Headcount 40

SaaStr

JUNE 23, 2020

Or churn will increase, NPS will stagnate and decline, and upsell and revenue retention will be a fraction of what it could be. You’ll need more than 5–6 core engineers to go big. You will need a VP of Engineering to manage these processes, recruit and build the team, and make your product more secure and enterprise-ready.

Part-Time VPE 230

Part-Time VPE CTO Hire Fractional VPE Sales Recruiting 230

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 11, 2021

Lately I’ve been working with 5+ SaaS companies all hiring their first VP of Product. And critically, most have a really strong CEO-CTO partnership. A few general learnings: A VP of Product that Reports to CTO / Engineering Rarely Meets With That Many Customers. I just see this time and time again.

Part-Time VPE 282

Part-Time VPE Outsourcing Services CTO Hire CTO 282

SaaStr

DECEMBER 23, 2019

From large scale mainstage sessions to intimate workshops and even a dedicated lounge, we are carving out some of SaaStr Annual just for developers and engineers. ” When to Hire and When to Automate” with Zapier CEO Wade Foster. The post Developers and Engineers! Have no fear, we have got you covered.

CTO Coach 142

CTO Coach Engineering CTO Hire Development 142

SaaStr

JULY 23, 2021

Brian Peterson, CTO @ Dialpad. Dave Walters, CTO, Hired. Christa Diaz, Senior Director, Customer Success, Hired. Amy Pisano, CRO, Hired. Jenn Knight, Co-Founder, CTO, AgentSync. Rhonda SekaBuehler Senior Vice President of Global Sales Engineering @WalkMe. Zach Kitschke, CMO, Canva.

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VP of Engineering New CTO CTO Hire Sales Hiring 273

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 16, 2021

You’ll need to hire aggressively to get to the next level and continue that rapid growth. But what roles should you hire for, and what will your org chart look like at each stage? Positions Needed: Enterprise AEs, Mid-Market & SMB AEs, SDRs, Sales Ops, Sales Engineer. CTO (40 Employees). CTO (114 Employees).

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CTO Hire Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting CTO 236

SaaStr

AUGUST 20, 2023

In my first start-up, there were literally only a handful of engineers who understood our technology. The best we made our CTO. But what if our CTO gets hit by a bus? They feed on each other, hire other toxic people, and turn the company against the mission and each other. Sometimes, still hire them. For a while.

CTO Hire 211

CTO Hire CTO Technology Engineering 211

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 29, 2020

They’ll revolt when you make a senior or mid-level hire that as a group, they simply cannot suffer one day longer. It’s happened to me, and I think for whatever my faults, I have a pretty high EQ and am a half-decent manager. The three times it happened to me: A very senior engineer that we just HAD to have.

Part-Time VPE 273

Part-Time VPE Sales Hiring CTO Hire Scale 273

SaaStr

OCTOBER 29, 2021

Use overages to renegotiate contracts, not charge per event. Folks come out differently here, but while Amplitude charges per volume, in part, it doesn’t make a material amount from overages. 245 employees in Sales & Marketing — vs. 101 in Engineering / R&D. The engineering team is also surprisingly lean. #7.

Scale 256

Scale CTO Hire New CTO CTO 256

SaaStr

MAY 3, 2021

And importantly, you need to spend more time with your existing customers (vs. But even if you’ve hired the world’s best VP of Sales … you can’t opt out of sales entirely. You still need to spend 15-20% of your time in sales. Hire a VP of Finance or even a CFO Early if You Are Growing Quickly.

Part-Time VPE 272

Part-Time VPE Sales Hiring Sales Recruiting Outsourcing Services 272

SaaStr

MARCH 7, 2021

These are all full-time jobs by $1m ARR. Fixing it yourself becomes the biggest time sink and excuse for not hiring there is. You end up spending all your time backfilling roles you should have hired. And even worse, you often sort of give up trying to make the hire. That’s when you want to lean in.

Part-Time VPE 257

Part-Time VPE Sales Recruiting Sales Hiring Scale 257

SaaStr

DECEMBER 10, 2020

Hire not just 1-2 reps, but 10. That it’s time to bring in someone that knows. But I’ve found many great SaaS founders take longer, too long, to decide to hire the other VPs. But I’ve found many great SaaS founders take longer, too long, to decide to hire the other VPs. Of Engineering.

Sales Hiring 350

Sales Hiring CTO Hire Sales Recruiting Scale 350

SaaStr

JUNE 12, 2022

SaaStr 559: Secrets to Building Your Marketing Engine To Drive Scale with Airtable CMO Archana Agrawal. with Jenn Knight, Co-founder and CTO of AgentSync, and Daryna Kulya, Co-founder of OpenPhone. Attract, Hire & Build a Diverse Sales Team | Handshake VP, Employer Partnerships Jessica Peluso. Top Videos This Week: 1.

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Scale Sales Hiring CTO Hire CTO 163

Intercom, Inc.

AUGUST 15, 2018

On day one as Reddit’s new VP of Engineering, Nick Caldwell faced a dilemma. He had just spent 13 years at Microsoft, most recently as the head of 300 engineers. At Reddit, he led a team of 35 – none of whom knew how to manage other engineers. Building trust can be tough when you’re a new hire in a leadership position.

Leadership 141

Leadership Engineering Part-Time VPE CTO Coach 141

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 27, 2020

It is a prerequisite to hire folks with a high IQ to success in software. You probably need a wicked smart CTO, some incredible engineers, maybe an insanely smart head of product or marketing, etc. Q: Is it a prerequisite to have a high IQ in order to succeed as a tech entrepreneur?

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CTO Hire CTO Engineering Software 179

SaaStr

AUGUST 25, 2023

You have to see: A couple of good hires brought in Improvement on some metrics A big deal or two hanging out there, brought in and closed Things taken off your plate. More time may make them better if they’re already progressing, even if it’s just 10-15% in the first sales cycle. Hiring someone too junior. That often compounds.

Part-Time VPE 173

Part-Time VPE Scale Sales Hiring CTO Hire 173

OpenView Labs

APRIL 12, 2019

Getting hiring right is absolutely critical. I’d like to talk about two different companies with two very different approaches to hiring post-seed raise. I’m focusing on engineering in these examples, but the experience applies to other areas of the business. To get the team started we hired several junior developers.

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CTO Hire Investment New CTO CTO 64

User Pilot

JULY 27, 2023

Before hiring, assess your current needs and hire as your company grows. Engineering Manager: In charge of planning, designing, and overseeing projects. They also manage finances and supervise one or more engineering teams. Much of the success here depends on how competent and motivated the CTO and their team is.

Sales Hiring 98

Sales Hiring SaaS Payments Sales Recruiting CTO Hire 98

Crafty CTO

FEBRUARY 7, 2023

Yes, I needed to replatform my blog, but I also needed a web presence for my new fractional CTOing entity. In the end, I found a name that I think works well for both (ask me again in 5 years): Crafty CTO / craftycto.com for the entity, with the blog living at CraftyCTO.com/blog.

CTO Hire 40

CTO Hire New CTO CTO Software Engineering 40

Valerian Tech

FEBRUARY 10, 2023

How can CTO’s help ensure the Success of a Cryptocurrency Project? Stay up to date on industry trends: The cryptocurrency industry is rapidly evolving, and it is important for the CTO to stay up to date on the latest technologies, trends, and best practices. This will help ensure that the project remains competitive and relevant.

Part-Time CTO 52

Part-Time CTO CTO CTO Coach CTO Hire 52

Andreessen Horowitz

DECEMBER 4, 2023

To improve the efficiency of spend on cost of goods sold (COGS), most growth-stage leaders can optimize seat-based spend or renegotiate consumption-based contracts in a quarter or 2. Focus on performance management of your product and engineering teams as early indicators for what R&D investments are working, and which aren’t.

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Underperforming Technical Team Benchmarks CTO Hire New CTO 118

Intercom, Inc.

APRIL 19, 2018

In engineering, you want to move fast, ship often and solve real customer problems. It means reducing choices amongst engineering teams and standardizing technology, so our team can spend as much time as possible delivering value to customers. Rich: Today I’m the Senior Director for Foundations Engineering at Intercom.

Outsourcing Services 192

Outsourcing Services Part-Time VPE Software AWS 192

Intercom, Inc.

APRIL 22, 2021

For those who don’t know him, Will has over 10 years of experience in the likes of Yahoo, Digg, Uber, and Stripe, and he’s currently the CTO of Calm , the mindfulness app that helps millions of people to lower their stress levels and sleep better. If you’re a senior engineer and want to further your career, what skills should you develop?

Technical Review 274

Technical Review Leadership VP of Engineering CTO Coach 274

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 11, 2019

Well, we did the heavy lifting and highlighted a few here for you… “When to Hire and When to Automate” with Zapier CEO Wade Foster. Henrique and co-founder Pedro Franceschi founded the company as 22-year-old engineers in Brazil in 2017. At the time the duo had founded Pagar.me, a payment processor.

Payment Services 100

Payment Services CTO Hire Payments New CTO 100

Sales Hacker

FEBRUARY 17, 2021

Your CTO probably does not need to be on the first Demo, but instead that could be an opportune time to loop in a Manager or director. After all, a CTO can’t handhold the entire deal cycle, but they can jump in and provide clarity and an expert voice at critical points. Who doesn’t love a good combo of ham, egg and cheese?

Underperforming Technical Team 121

Underperforming Technical Team CTO Hire CTO Coach Technical Review 121

SaaStr

OCTOBER 24, 2022

They’re able to actually swipe a credit card, and what starts off similar to a freemium self-serve product can turn into a six-figure contract in just a few months. It might even be months later that a VP of Engineering or a CTO or CFO realizes that they’re built on a new platform. The contract size grows.

Underperforming Technical Team 172

Underperforming Technical Team Outsourced Development Development Part-Time VPE 172

Intercom, Inc.

FEBRUARY 22, 2022

Hiring and cultivating incredible talent on our Information Security team. Shipping is our heartbeat ” has been the motto of the Intercom R&D org from the very beginning and engineers ship code to our customer-facing production app dozens of times a day. Shipping quickly and securely. Continuous risk management.

Data 118

Data compliance Technical Review CTO Hire 118

Casey Accidental

JUNE 8, 2021

I was able to hire a strong team, and we got to work, 100xing the size of our customer base over four years. As part of this process, a lot of what I tried to do was reduce distractions for the team. When I started managing teams at Grubhub over a decade ago, I was pretty obsessed with high performance.

CTO Hire 125

CTO Hire Venture Capital CTO Communication 125

Baremetrics

DECEMBER 7, 2023

Example of SaaS Chart of Accounts for Marketing Expenses Research & Development (Engineering) There are fewer direct benefits from splitting out your tech team from the rest of the expenses, but I still recommend doing it. First of all, you should compare your current engineering spend and compare it against your forecast.

Merchant Services 90

Merchant Services Startup DevOps as a Service SaaS 90

Buffer Resources

DECEMBER 1, 2023

Then, they might call on an Engineer or Product Manager, who will be able to share more about the system, maybe even how this may change as part of the roadmap for the future. Andy Yates, Staff Engineer 📍Started at Buffer in June 2012 as iOS Engineering Lead 🌎 Location: California, U.S. ” 2.

VP of Engineering 95

VP of Engineering Part-Time CTO New CTO CTO 95

Casey Accidental

FEBRUARY 8, 2022

Engineering: Scaling Product Delivery , Technical Strategy , Engineering Management (new). Programs are 4-6 weeks in length, part-time, and held in a virtual format, guided by an executive. Engineering Programs. Engineering Management. Harsh Sinha , CTO at Wise, formerly PayPal, Ebay.

CTO Coach 52

CTO Coach CTO Hire New CTO Scale 52

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 11, 2022

Your core models for sales, for marketing spend, for hiring and engineering and product. And the best CTO I know in the world is the CEO. Anyhow, so then he went and he was a romantic and he did a search company, great engineer, hard problem, search. We have a 60% chance that we can do it. He made a little bit of money.

Outsourcing Services 177

Outsourcing Services Banking CTO Hire New CTO 177

SaaStr

AUGUST 31, 2023

Dear SaaStr: How does a First Time Founder Identify 10x Hires? How do you hire a great CTO, a great VP of Product, a great VP of Sales … if you’ve never worked with one? There’s a reason almost every founder you talk to had a mis-hire for their first head of sales. It’s hard.

Sales Hiring 198

Sales Hiring CTO Hire CTO Coach CTO 198

OpenView Labs

OCTOBER 11, 2019

At Hired, we started out with a transactional model that was—at the time—a super disruptive approach and one of our key differentiators. This is why, when it came time to shift from a transactional to a subscription pricing model, our team at Hired didn’t hesitate for a moment. Customers called us. No unexpected costs.

Sales Hiring 40

Sales Hiring Part-Time VPE CTO Hire Technical Review 40

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 25, 2020

hiring in-house talent). “The initial appeal was just how easy it was to work with the system,” CTO and Cofounder David Heinemeier Hansson said, “that we knew rates were up to date and we were billing our customers for the right rates and we could defend that when we were submitting our paperwork.” ” 2.

Merchant Services 171

Merchant Services Scale Technical Review Sales Hiring 171

Intercom, Inc.

DECEMBER 21, 2021

Will Larson , CTO of Calm. Des Traynor , Co-founder and CTO of Intercom. There are plenty of resources and advice on unlocking the secrets of the engineering management career path. Karen Peacock: In college, I studied math and computer science and engineering. Janeen Uzzell , COO for Wikimedia Foundation.

VP of Engineering 118

VP of Engineering Scale Technical Review Outsourcing Services 118