I find it interesting if not a little disconcerting that the equity table has the startup hiring a COO at 2% - 5% equity but no CTO and the closest it has listed is "Lead Engineer" at 0.5% - 1%. I suppose there could be a VP of engineering under that chart since it doesn't specify what type of VP.<p>This article seems to be propagating the myth that engineers need MBA types more than they need engineers.<p>The article also advocates heavy contracting.<p>Speaking from experience, if you are contracting out most of your software engineering and don't have a CTO type role who knows what good code is and knows how to manage the contractors, you are in for a really bad time when you do decide to bring on full time software engineers. You risk overpaying and risk having completely unmaintainable code that doesn't scale with your business.<p>Conversely, much of what a COO does can be done by the CEO at early stages.<p>Of course, no two startups are the same. In fact, a bad CTO can be more damaging that not having any. Which is why it is important you screen your hires well. However, your milage may vary.