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Writer's pictureGiao Huynh

CTO: Roles And Different Kinds Of CTOs

Updated: Jul 25, 2022


A chief technology officer (CTO) is the person who leads the organization's technological needs as well as its research and development (R&D). Based on the size and stage of a company’s growth, the CTO has a different role. It is simple to know that a chief technology officer (CTO) is responsible for overseeing the development and dissemination of technology for external customers, vendors, and clients to help improve and increase business.




Nowadays, CTOs play an important role in modern business. Don’t just focus on efficiency,

CTOs need to develop strategies to provide value to their clients and power the future. And to do this, CTOs need to adopt many different personas within an organization—to the business, you’re the tech guy, and to the technology team, you’re the business guy. This gives the CTO a high level of freedom to operate, but it can also be a lonely place.


Types of Chief Technology Officers


For a start-up, CTO is not the same as CTO at a big, well-established company. The main scope of the responsibility is to translate the vision and mission of the company, determine problems, and find solutions, as well as be committed to building a culture that works. Of course, they are hired to be in charge of the company's technological development. They need to have business domain knowledge and a concept and define what customers need.


Midsize CTOs have fewer duties. They develop policies, supervise the technology strategy, and use technology to enhance products and services that focus on external customers. Their main responsibility is to build a team and standardize functions like the engineering team, development team, cloud/network team, and quality assurance team. Moreover, they are also people who have deep knowledge of both technology and management in order to translate the global vision into detailed goals and handle the teams well. They need to define what is urgent and what is important.


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In a larger company, the CTO is the person who takes the role of a planner. They will think of a strategy and their next steps. They can set the strategy of culture and technology in order to future-proof the business. They are known as charismatic visionaries and spokespersons and are an integral part of the leadership team.



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