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Startup CTO or Developer

TechEmpower SaaS

But hiring a lead developer, or even a VP of Engineering, can create a gap between the founders and the developers. Closing the Gap: Hiring A Fractional Startup CTO We’re not suggesting that early-stage startups should hire a full-time CTO. Instead, they should consider a Fractional CTO who can help close the gap.

CTO Hire 390
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Dear SaaStr: What’s The Number One Challenge for Scale-Up Stage Founders?

SaaStr

You can smother customers with love alone in the early days, but as you scale, you need a seasoned customer success team and VP that has done this before. 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 5–10 engineers to go big.

Scale 241
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Everything is Sort of the Same at a Given ACV (Annual Contract Value)

SaaStr

But there’s one thing I can tell you in SaaS, at least: Almost Everything Except the Product Itself is Sort of the Same at a Given ACV (Annual Contract Value) Level. You may need solutions architects, more sales engineers, more support. Your engineers can build complex features that only a handful of customers use.

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5 Interesting Learnings from Okta at $2.5 Billion in ARR

SaaStr

Founder CEO Todd McKinnon was VP of Engineering at Salesforce and left to start Okta in the depths of the last downturn. Seat Contractions Have Brought NRR Down From 120% to 111% While 111% NRR is still quite an engine at this scale, the drop in NRR from seat contractions explains a good chunk of the headwinds Okta has seen. #2.

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What’s The #1 Challenge After $1m-$2m ARR?

SaaStr

You can smother customers with love alone in the early days, but as you scale, you need a seasoned customer success team and VP that has done this before. 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.

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Meet the SaaStr Europa 2022 Speakers!

SaaStr

Dave Kellogg, Principal @ Dave Kellogg Consulting. Michael Manapat, Head of Engineering @ Notion. Krista Moroder, Director of Engineering @ Checkr. Pierre Alain Bouchard, VP of Engineering @ Zendesk. Pierre Alain Bouchard, VP of Engineering @ Zendesk. Giorgos Ampavis, VP of Engineering @ Tide.

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The Founder’s Guide to Developer-led Growth with WorkOS (Video)

SaaStr

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.