[Hiring] Chief of Staff to the CTO @Intercept

Role Description

We’re looking for a Chief of Staff to the CTO. The Chief of Staff to the CTO is a hybrid role: half deputy, half engineering leader. You will represent the CTO in meetings the CTO cannot attend, and you will directly manage the Solutions Engineering pod that carries our technical client work.

This is not a note-taking job. When you sit in a client meeting with Microsoft, SAP or Cisco in place of the CTO, you are expected to answer technical questions, commit to scope, and be trusted to have made the right call. That means you need real engineering depth alongside the presence to hold a room of enterprise stakeholders. Inside the agency, you own delivery, hiring and headcount for the pod, and you bring the CTO a clear recommendation on the AI tooling our teams should be using. You will provide portfolio and progress updates on all technical projects and innovation initiatives to the executive leadership team.

Responsibilities

• Stand in for the CTO:
  • Attend internal leadership meetings, client calls and technical reviews on the CTO’s behalf.
  • Make decisions in the room within an agreed scope, record what was decided, and escalate only what truly needs the CTO.
• Manage the Solutions Engineering pod:
  • Own the pod’s goals, delivery commitments and the growth of the people on it.
  • Step in when a client engagement is off track.
• Stay hands-on:
  • Review solution architectures and technical proposals before they reach a client.
  • Read the code when a decision is contested.
• Own client-facing technical conversations:
  • Run scoping and solutioning sessions with enterprise accounts.
  • Translate what the client actually needs into work the pod can deliver.
  • Defend the timeline when someone pushes back.
• Evaluate AI tooling and recommend what we adopt:
  • Run the hands-on evaluation and vetting of AI tools.
  • Bring the CTO a recommendation with your reasoning and what you rejected.
• Own portfolio and resource management:
  • Keep a current view of every project and initiative the technical team is running.
  • Report on status, risk and progress to the CTO and the leadership team.
  • Forecast where we will be short on people, flag it before it becomes a missed date, and decide who works on what.
• Hire and grow the pod:
  • Own recruiting, interviewing and onboarding for Solutions Engineering.
  • Decide who joins and how the team is shaped as the work grows.
• Run the CTO’s operating cadence:
  • Set the agenda for technical planning.
  • Keep a written record of open decisions and their owners.
  • Chase the follow-through so nothing quietly dies between meetings.
• Connect engineering to the account teams:
  • Sit between client services and the Solutions Engineering pod.
  • Ensure commitments made to clients match what the team can actually build.
  • Ensure engineering context reaches the people who talk to the client.

Qualifications

• Four or more years in a technical role with a track record of owning technical work end to end rather than being handed tasks.
• A hands-on engineering background in solutions engineering or software engineering.
• Working knowledge of the cloud platforms our clients run on, including AWS, Azure or Google Cloud.
• Experience in front of enterprise clients from pre-sales, solutions consulting, professional services or agency delivery.
• Real experience evaluating AI tooling, including what you recommended, what you rejected and why.
• Clear written communication.
• Sound judgment under ambiguity.
• Comfortable working fully remote across a distributed team, with occasional travel for client and team meetings.

Nice to Have

• Experience managing resources and running performance management conversations.