CTO · VP Engineering · Head of Engineering
Technical Due Diligence Prep for CTOs
The investor's tech advisor will pull two threads out of your dataroom. Which two is the whole game, because every answer in a technical assessment lands as one of three things: a follow-up call, a discount on the valuation, or a pass.
Raising, or just raised, is one of the six situations CTOs bring to me most often. The goal is simple to state and hard to do alone: rehearse the assessment before it happens, so no thread gets pulled that you have not already pulled yourself.
The situation, from the inside
Investor called Tuesday. Due diligence is next week. Roadmap, hiring plan, security posture, architecture story, tech-debt cost. I know what to say. I also know that what I say has to survive their tech advisor, who will pull two threads. And I have no idea which two.
You have probably tried
- Writing the answer three times, deleting all three
- Asking your CFO what the last CTO said (he shrugged)
- Reading Y Combinator threads about due diligence
- Adding tech-debt paydown to the roadmap "just in case"
How we tackle it
We rehearse the technical assessment before you send it. Which answers get you a follow-up call, which get you a discount, which get you a pass. Then we design the 12-month hiring and delivery narrative that matches the money.
Target: Before due diligence: technical assessment drafted, rehearsed, and pressure-tested. No surprise threads pulled.
Working it 1:1
Bi-weekly 60-minute sessions, weekly while the fire burns. I have sat in the seat: built Mews into a $2bn+ unicorn from 8 to 80 teams, led engineering at Manta before IBM acquired it, and spent 4+ years in the Bay Area as Principal Software Architect at Databricks. The pattern data comes from 3,400+ unique sessions with engineering leaders in 17+ countries. Rated 9.17/10 on average across 300+ reviews.
Pricing is public: 430 EUR per session, 361 EUR per session for ELC members, or 2,580 EUR per quarter (6 sessions over 3 months). You only pay for a session you rate 7 out of 10 or higher. Full pricing.
Related reads
The other situations CTOs bring
- The board wants a delivery number →
- First 90 days in an inherited org →
- AI adoption pressure from the board →
- Every decision routes through you →
- A sounding board without politics →
All six, plus the questions CTOs ask most: CTO coaching & mentoring