How to Find a CTO Job
Get your dream job in a bad market
Inkmi is a website for CTOs, VPs of Engineering, senior engineering leaders, and senior developers to find their CTO dream jobs. I am giving tips on salary, promotions and your CTO career on the Inkmi Blog.
I know several CTOs and VPs of Engineering looking for a new job. And perhaps you are one of them. Or a team lead who wants to become a CTO.
How do you find a CTO job?
My first advice would be to network more. I know many of you don’t want to network because they don’t feel like it. You can do low energy and casual networking though. First, think about where potential employers hang around and where you can hang around too. Three kinds of people come to mind. CEOs, HR and founders. CEOs can mostly be found at business conferences. HR have their own thing going, and it might not easy getting in (or be in any way interesting), if you don’t work for HR. Founders can be found at startup conferences and might be the easiest target. What does casual networking look like? Hang around, stand next to people for some time. Wear a T-Shirt which says, “I’m a CTO, talk to me :-)” Ask “Hi, my name is Stephan, what are you doing here”? The idea is that you can just drop that you are a CTO or an engineering manager on the lookout for a CTO position. CTOs are highly sought after, perhaps one of the people there needs one, or their golf buddy needs one, or at least they know someone looking for a CTO.
My second advice is to look for companies who got an investment or are known that they are in the process of looking for an investment. They might need a CTO to get an investment, or they got the investment with the condition from the VC to get a proper CTO. They are in need, even if they don’t advertise for an open CTO position. Many startup websites have a category for articles about investment rounds.
Third advice is to look for CTOs leaving. Often there is news that a CTO is leaving their job. Or you can find a CTO on LinkedIn posting about a new job. Quite often, because it takes so much time to find a CTO, their last employer has not filled the gap, and might not even have put up a job ad. This is an opportunity to proactively ask about the potential job opening. Bonus advice: Ask the CEO if it makes sense to apply for the CTO role, don’t ask HR. When the CEO says yes, send them your CV or send HR the CV with the note “as requested by your CEO”.
The same goes for cold calling. Contact CEOs directly on Linkedin, ask “I would love to work for you. Are you looking for a CTO, would it make sense to send my CV”? Do this blindly, they might need a CTO or they might be thinking about firing their CTO for some months, but they are anxious to do so.
Do you have CTO friends? Are they looking for a new job? Would you like their job? If they recommend you, there is a much higher probability that you will get that job. Don’t be shy to ask. You might feel it is inappropriate to ask, or that you inherit your friends’ work, or it might reflect bad to developers at the new company. Don’t be afraid, you can make it all work.
Next advice: Have a proper LinkedIn profile. I often review LinkedIn profiles, and they are not properly set up. Don’t lie, but streamline the titles, the companies and what you have achieved. Put in keywords so a headhunter finds you an interesting match for a search mandate. If you have a proper profile, headhunters will contact you. Don’t have an anemic profile.
Speaking of headhunters, you can get a CTO job without one. But there is one exception: If you want a CTO job in a large company, there is no way around an executive search company. Large enterprises will rely on the brand of the executive search company and their perceived quality of screening and matching candidates. Even if you send a CV, there is a high probability you won’t be considered without going through an executive search firm.
One more advice: Follow companies you want to work for on LinkedIn, especially their HR departments, and share, like and comment. Express how you love the company. For sure, if they are out for a new CTO, guess who is already there? You!
Finally, get out and talk at conferences. Again, not at conferences for developers, but at conferences where there are people who could hire you. When I was looking for a CTO job, I run the conference gauntlet. A talk I gave several times was “IT for Startup Founders.”
*When I hear from clients, job ads don’t work for me finding a new CTO job, I tell them to do more. There is a lot you can do, to find your dream CTO job. *
About Inkmi
Inkmi is a website with Dream Jobs for CTOs. We're on a mission to transform the industry to create more dream jobs for CTOs. If you're a seasoned CTO looking for a new job, or a senior developer ready for your first CTO calling, head over to https://www.inkmi.com