So my situation is pretty unique.<p>I have a pretty competent team building out the product for our local social commerce concept and we're on our way to raising angel funding (we've already had a seed round), but my CTO is overseas. He's a family friend with 6 years of RoR experience and he has been awesome to us, but right now we're running into some visa issues...<p>He may not PHYSICALLY be with us for a bit but can continue to work.<p>During the initial meetings, a lot of investors asked if we can try to hire someone from the U.S. as another technical co-founder or to maybe even replace the CTO. No one is worried about the business side because we're pretty stacked on that end.<p>Any thoughts on best way to go about this?
What are the best sources to recruit a potential replacement CTO / another technical co-founder with potential to become the CTO?<p>Anyone interested? (haha. figured it wouldn't hurt to ask). Any help or advice from the hacker news community would be very much appreciated!
It certainly <i>sounds</i> like you already decided to sell your present CTO down the river, and (at least) downgrade his title/responsibility on the advice of investors. All good. Just capitalism at work, and engineers have a history of being shafted by the MBA types after doing a lot of work getting something to an investable-in stage. (but why would yet another capable engineer (the type you want as a CTO) want to work with you if you have a history of treating your cofounder like this?)<p>Missing in all this - What does your present CTO think? (what does <i>he</i> think/say , (not what you think he would or should say,what does he actually think/say is a good solution?)
Does he have a history of bad results? I'd have a pretty strong reaction to potential investors suggesting I replace a capable employee, but it sounds like you're ready to ditch him at a moment's notice.<p>If he has a history of inconsistency, you don't need potential investors to tell you that. If he has proven capable, I'd be concerned about your concept of loyalty.
can you provide a link to the site so I can see where you guys are at?<p>what problem are you trying to solve or if not a distinct problem what are you trying to improve?
Kayak's co-founders never worked in the same place. One was CEO in Connecticut and the other CTO in Boston. An example of it working on a pretty big scale.
Perhaps you can clarify: Why are investors so concerned with the current CTO that they're asking for him to be replaced? (I would expect that if things are going well that most investors wouldn't want to change things unnecessarily. It <i>seems</i> like you agree with your investors... Do you?)