We have a brilliant CTO who built our initial software from scratch, but as we expand our engineering department to thirty people, he is drowning in management tasks and refuses to delegate, creating a massive development bottleneck. How do we address this on the Accountability Chart?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

Your CTO is experiencing a classic transition bottleneck. He possesses the capabilities to write code, but he lacks the GWC (Get It, Want It, Capacity to Do It) for the Lead, Manage, and Accountability seat required at thirty people. He is treating his role as a technical expert rather than an executive leader.

To fix this, you must first clarify the seat on your Accountability Chart. The head of engineering role in a thirty-person department is about resource allocation, system architecture, and talent development, not writing individual code. Sit down with him and lay out the core roles of his seat. Ask him honestly if he wants to manage people and build systems, or if he wants to focus purely on technical execution.

If he lacks the Capacity to manage a large team, you need to restructure. This often means hiring a VP of Engineering to run the operational side of the department, while moving your CTO to a Chief Architect seat where he can focus on his cognitive and conative strengths. Use the Kolbe A Index to see if his natural instincts are suited for system design or technical experimentation. Do not leave him in a seat where his lack of management capability bottlenecks the entire organization. Give him a clear path that respects his brilliance while freeing your engineering team to scale.