Senior technical leadership for post-MVP startups.
Skyhill is a fractional CTO practice for startups that have shipped an MVP and raised a seed round, but don't have a senior technical leader yet. Set the right technical direction, hire the right team, and ship faster, without the £200k cost and six-month search of a full-time CTO.
You've raised.
You've shipped.
Now what?
Investors are asking about your roadmap. Your team is looking to you for technical calls you're not sure about. And a full-time CTO is a £200k, six-month bet you're not ready to make.
- 01What do we build next?The roadmap, the architecture, and the stack decisions that have to survive your next round.
- 02Who do we hire, and where?The right engineers, in the right order, without burning runway on the wrong ones.
- 03Why aren't we shipping faster?Process, ownership, and a delivery cadence that keeps up with what you promised the board.
CTO-level judgement, a day or two a week.
Technical direction
What to build, what to ignore, and the architecture and stack to get you there. Decisions that hold up under scrutiny, and under load.
The right team
Hiring plans, role design, interview loops and vetting, so you bring on engineers who own their work and use AI well. Plus a global-hiring angle: one London salary, three strong engineers abroad.
Delivery speed
Process, ownership and a build-fast culture. A small, senior team that ships like one twice its size, without the bloat.
We start with a fit call, not a sales call.
A real working session
We pressure-test your biggest technical decision, and I tell you straight whether I can help. If we're not a fit, I'll point you to someone who is. No pitch, no obligation.
Start where you are
Begin with a fixed-scope Technical Direction Review, or go straight to a retainer. The lowest-risk way to start, or skip it and go straight in.
Embedded in your rhythm
Planning, architecture oversight, interviews, roadmap and hiring. Embedded in your team's cadence, a day or two a week.
I'm the engineer behind Skyhill. I've spent my career building software and leading engineering teams, most recently in senior engineering leadership at a Fortune 500 company. I've also built products inside startups, so I know how to decide what to build, not just how to build it. On our first call I'll walk you through my full background, the teams I've led, and the companies I've worked with, so you know exactly who you'd be working with.
Honest scope, honest hours. Priced to qualify, not to surprise.
Technical Direction Review
- Review of stack, architecture & priorities
- Team & hiring gap analysis
- Written findings + prioritised action plan
Technical Sounding Board
- Weekly 60–90 min strategy call
- Async Slack / WhatsApp access
- Ad-hoc doc & architecture reviews
Embedded Leadership
- Everything in Advisory, plus:
- Embedded in standups & planning
- PR / architecture oversight
- Owns roadmap, hiring & org design
Need something bigger or one-off, like a roadmap, architecture review or hiring-loop design? Ask on your fit call and I'll quote it.
Good questions,
straight answers.
Who is this for, and who isn't it for?
Post-MVP, post-seed startups with early traction that are about to scale the engineering team. If you're pre-product or idea-stage, I'm not the right fit yet, and on the fit call I'll happily point you to someone who is.
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.
Let's see if it's a fit.
A 30-minute working session on your biggest technical decision. We'll both know by the end whether to keep going.