CTO

CTO: how to become one and his tasks

A CTO mainly deals with the direction of the technical aspect of a company, coordinating the resources assigned to him. Basically, the Chief Technical Officer can be defined as the "IT project
manager", or the reference point of a team of developers, who in some situations can also operate in smart working. A CTO holds the position of 1st level manager within a company, and the main responsibilities is to monitor, in order to evaluate and suggest which technologies to be deployed.
All of this must be referred to the board of directors and its administrator. In this article we will see together how to become CTO, what are its tasks, the training course and the estimated.

CTO: a truly strategic role

In today's market, companies that have to manage digital, technical and IT development are more and more numerous. For this reason, these companies are increasingly resorting to a specialist figure such as CTO, able to combine "common" managerial skills with high-level technical knowledge. As indeed, technology is the main driver of growth for many companies, regardless of their sector, as a matter of fact.
Innovation is no longer just the prerogative of the future, but an integral part of our present. To date, if a company really wants to evolve, it has the urgent need to have human and also technological capital, but they must be top-level, and they should manage and implement on a daily basis. For these reasons, the figure of the CTO is gaining a higher profile, a highly specialized person able to follow the dynamics of the company's technical, digital and IT development. Obviously, the technological needs of the specific company can vary a lot from sector to sector, but the CTO always has the role of a supervisor who will never have to discuss the merits of the operation. This is because the figure has among the objectives to ensure an overview and global vision of technological processes as a whole. The CTO proposes investments, evaluates partnerships and possible mergers, modernization projects, coordinates the staff of each department for the areas related to him, also from a smart-work perspective, and organizes appropriate training
courses, specialist workshop and fairs.

Chief Technology Officer: responsibilities

The primary purpose of the Chief Technology Officer is to increase the company's competitiveness in the market to which it refers. This fundamental goal is achieved through a series of intermediate steps. The CTO will therefore:

• Monitor new technologies, in order to assess the application within the company;
• Evaluate the potential of other companies, so as to evaluate their collaborations, mergers, or possible acquisitions;
• Promote the technological level of their company by participating in workshop or conferences;
• Supervise research projects to ensure that they add value to the company. In summarizing the responsibilities of the Chief Technology Officer, we could say that this figure analyses and assesses what the real possibilities are offered by technology, transforming them into strategic decisions for the company. All of this will have to be implemented by collaborating
  with the heads of the scientific laboratory and the "Research and Development" sector.

CTO: training course

First of all, a CTO does not only have technical skills. Obviously, his work depends very much on the business context in which he operates, but he must be considered as Product Expert for which
he directs the part of the technological systems, but also as a connoisseur of the market niche within which that particular product or service is placed.
Frequently, and also in this case depending on the type of the company, those who reach such a career position are graduates and have completed a 4/5 years academic course in scientific
disciplines. Among the main disciplines we certainly find computer science, engineering and mathematics, without neglecting some exceptions that take into consideration mainly humanistic
faculties.
Secondly, a CTO has, for obvious reasons, web/development skills, in both back-end and front-end areas. In any case, to become a figure of this type, the ability to produce quality code must be the basis, and also he should demonstrate managerial and business vision in the medium and long term. The second factor is common to anyone who can fill relevant roles within a company.

Chief Technical Officer: how to be one?

Beyond the training course, obviously to become a CTO are very important years of experience, as well as the number of projects and code implemented, and the complexity of the situations
managed. This because it’s different being the CTO of a small start-up or doing it for an already well-structured company. They are very different situations.
In the first case, in fact, it is necessary to have knowledge of what the product code is, while in the second, in the absence of a global vision of the sector within which he operates, it is not possible to
be a CTO. In other words, for a successful career, experience and vision are needed. Surely the right contacts and networks can help a lot, as in any field.

Chief Technical Officer: how much does he earn?

Among the many digital professions, the Chief Technical Officer is certainly one of the most important in the job market. We are talking about a position where the offers are higher than the
real availability of professionals. For this reason, for the best CTOs, the real career expectations are very high, also because we are talking about a figure who takes on a large number of
responsibilities. To better understand the importance, just consider that in some particularly innovative start-ups, the CTO often corresponds also to one of the founders.
Defining the precise amount of the salary of a Chief Technical Officer is not possible, because there are many variables involved, starting from the size of the company, up to the actual experience
level. On average, however, we can say that the remuneration for this figure, usually starts from the 50,000 euros gross per year, but in some cases, it can easily exceed even the 100,000 euros
gross per year. It should be noted that those are the average wages of the Italian labour market, but in some foreign companies they might be considerably higher.

Chief Technical Officer: why become one and why count on it

Becoming a Chief Technical Officer can be a very important milestone in a person's life. The reasons can be listed quickly enough. Firstly, as we have seen, this profession can lead to high
rates of pay, capable of guaranteeing a good standard of living. But not only the economic aspect should determine this choice, because we are talking about a job that can be very rewarding, both professionally and personally. In fact, the most talented CTOs become a real reference point for companies.
Why should a company resort to the Chief Technical Officer? Because as already outlined, the role of technology in modern businesses has become more and more predominant. In addition, this technology in recent years has been evolving more quickly than ever, therefore all these changes must be correctly interpreted, with the aim of making them useful to the company. In other words, this professional can really increase market performance, leading this company to a prominent position.