Senior technical judgement, on your side of the table.
Every technical decision that matters, explained in your language, made by you. You'll know whether your dev team is any good, where your money is actually going, and what to say when investors dig into the tech. No £200k salary, no six-month search.
You've raised.
You've shipped.
You're still guessing.
You can't tell if your dev shop is good value. You can't tell whether the confident answers you're getting are true. That's not a personal failing. It's what happens with no senior engineer in your corner. And it's fixable.
- 01Am I paying for good work, or just paying?Scope creeps, estimates balloon, and every agency knows exactly how much their client can see.
- 02Would we survive technical due diligence?Before your next round, an investor's tech adviser will open the bonnet. The answers need to be ready before the questions arrive.
- 03Am I "just the business person"?Whoever understands the code holds the real control. Right now, that isn't you. It can be.
That judgement, a day or two a week.
Technical direction
What to build, what to skip, and the architecture to carry it. I'll stop you over-building as often as under-building. Decisions that hold up under scrutiny, and under load.
The right team
Who to hire, in what order, and how to tell they're good. I design the loop and sit in the interviews you can't judge alone. No more hiring on gut and CV.
Delivery speed
Process, ownership, and a straight read on your agency or freelancers. You'll know what's shipping, when, and whether you're getting what you pay for.
It starts with a fit call. After that, only what you actually need.
A real working session
Bring the decision that's actually bothering you. We work it live, and you leave knowing where you stand. If I'm not the right person, I'll point you to who is. No pitch, no deck.
Start small, on purpose
Most founders start with the fixed-price review: an independent read on your code, your team and your spend. One price, two weeks, useful even if we never speak again.
Embedded in your rhythm
Weekly planning, architecture oversight, interviews and the roadmap. In your team's cadence, a day or two a week, until you outgrow me and hire full-time.
I'm the engineer behind Skyhill. I've spent my career building software and running engineering teams, most recently in senior engineering leadership at a Fortune 500 company. Along the way I worked closely with founders, and I saw what the technical side does to them. Week after week of high-stakes decisions in a language you don't quite speak. The invoice that keeps growing. The 'nearly done' that never lands. The meeting where you nod along and hope nobody asks a follow-up. I've spent those same years on the other side of it: setting direction, running hiring loops, making the architecture calls and living with them, and explaining it all in language the people writing the cheques could act on.
Honest scope, honest hours, prices on the page.
Independent Technical Review
- Your code, architecture and priorities, read properly
- Your team and agency spend, sanity-checked
- A written report you own, in plain English
Technical Sounding Board
- Weekly 60–90 min working call
- Slack or WhatsApp when it comes up
- Docs and architecture reviewed before you commit
Embedded Leadership
- Everything in Advisory, plus:
- Embedded in standups & planning
- Code & architecture oversight
- Owns roadmap, hiring & org design
Need a one-off instead? Due-diligence prep, an architecture review, a hiring loop. Ask on the fit call and I'll quote it.
Good questions,
straight answers.
Who is this for, and who isn't it for?
Founders who've raised £500k to £3m, have a product live, and don't have a CTO or senior technical leader. Technical yourself or not. If you're pre-product, or your technical co-founder has it covered, you don't need me, and I'll tell you on the call.
How many hours do I actually get?
Advisory is around 8 hours a month. The embedded Fractional CTO retainer is an honest one day a week, roughly 32 hours a month. No day-rate games, no calling half the time a full day.
How fast can you start?
Typically two to four weeks from our fit call. Enough time to scope properly, soon enough to matter.
Do I need to be technical to get value from this?
No. That's the point. You bring the business judgement, I bring the technical judgement, and everything gets explained in plain English. Nobody gets made to feel stupid for asking.
Is fractional actually committed, or just billing hours across ten clients?
I take on a small number of clients and the hours are the hours. You'll see me in your planning, your interviews and your Slack. If I can't give an engagement what it needs, I don't take it on.
Let's see if it's a fit.
Thirty minutes on the technical question that's actually bothering you. You'll leave with a straight answer, even if it's that you don't need me yet.