What's a CTO Mentoring Circle?

Meeting monthly, Mentoring Circles provide you with regular, facilitator-led discussions and learning in a small group of peers
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Circles are groups of up to 7 technology leaders of similar experience levels

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Each Circle is facilitated by an experienced CTO Coach

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Members suggest and vote on discussion topics for each session

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Members bring their own experiences, along with new models from the Coach

Why Join a CTO Mentoring Circle?

Build a trusted network: share reflections, stories, experiences, lessons and best practices with a small group of leaders in similar positions.

Curated groups: we choose leaders with similar levels of experience, team size and structure and business stage.

Experienced facilitator: the groups are led by a CTO who’s been in your position, and can help guide through to solutions and provide mental tools.

Commitment to improvement: membership of a group brings accountability for continuous improvement and openness.

Full access to Campus: Circle members have access to all courses, assessments, groups and resources in our exclusive learning platform.

Why Join a CTO Mentoring Circle?

Feedback from Circle Members

We love hearing from our Community and Circle members - see how CTO Craft has helped them below

Claire Donald, VP Engineering at MOO.com

"Being part of a Mentoring Circle has been a very valuable learning experience. I'm able to connect with other leaders outside of my own industry, where we can share knowledge and give advice on our own individual challenges"

Jon Topper, CTO at The Scale Factory

"The Mentoring Circle was extremely valuable - it was useful to be able to talk openly about our challenges, gain insights and new perspectives from other attendees, and to learn new tools and techniques useful to the CTO role."

Sarah Hale, Director of Engineering at Unity

"The Mentoring Circles in particular have been a highlight - having an experienced coach facilitating discussions between engineering leaders from different backgrounds who are facing similar challenges has been incredibly valuable."

Emanuele Blanco, CTO at Moneyfarm

"I heard about the great CTO Craft community from a fellow CTO and was glad to join. There's lots of different experiences and points of view, and I felt I could both get and give back to the community."

Marcus Lambert, CTO at Omobono

"The Mentoring Circle has been outstanding - it has helped me to reflect on my leadership style, identifying areas for improvement and helped me communicate clearly with my teams. As I direct result of an idea/perspective we had in the circle, I have made 50k cost-saving at Omobono, highly recommended."

Tom Watson, CTO at Hubble

"The Circle was an amazing experience. Not only was the coach great but hearing from other CTOs with similar challenges at different stages was equally as valuable. I feel a lot more equipped to manage as the company grows and changes."

Charaka Goonatilake, CTO at Panaseer

"A truly unique coaching experience – providing sorely needed support for technical leaders. It's a hugely effective concept to bring together individuals leading technical organisations together with a seasoned CTO to discuss problems and actionable solutions."

Guy Farley, CTO at Bought By Many

"The CTO Craft Mentoring Circle was a great learning experience and huge fun. Our Coach had a model to share for every conceivable management situation and it was great just to share experiences, and frustrations, with other CTOs."

John Plummer, Head of Development at Reevoo

"What I have appreciated most is being able to ask very specific questions about real situations and getting actionable feedback and also recommendations on tools and reading that would be useful in similar future situations."

Arif Shanji, Head of Development at Kano

"I think the sessions are brilliant and I'm learning a lot. There's a good mix of participants at different levels. We're going at a good pace with bite-sized material."

Allistair Crossley, CTO at Coconut

"Taking part in a Circle whilst also launching a FinTech business was especially useful to me as I was able to raise a bunch of real-time challenges and get the group's take every week, practice and report back the week after on results (CI with people!). By the end of the Circle I felt more confident, capable and equipped to discharge the role of CTO."

Dr Ole Moeller-Nilsson, CTO at Pivigo

"The CTO Craft mentoring group was fantastic; the various open discussions in a small group around a wide variety of topics really helped me build my confidence as first time CTO."

Matt Varughese, CTO at Drover

"It was a great way to find new and practical solutions to various real challenges I have faced. Overall a fantastic opportunity to learn from others, who have been through similar experiences and can share their thoughts and advice."

Nayur Khan, Global Head of Technical Delivery at QuantumBlack

"The workshop was incredibly insightful and very well run. It aimed to brainstorm through unconscious biases and fears around recruiting junior talent, and provide useful and practical tips to overcome them."

WHO ARE THE COACHES?

Circles and One-to-One Coaching Programmes are facilitated by experienced former CTOs from businesses like Made.com, Secret Sales, MyDeco, Photobox, Graze and more.

Andy Skipper

CTO Coach, former CTO at Comic Relief and Made.com

Laura Tacho

Engineering Leadership Coach and Consulting CTO/VPE

Joel Chippindale

CTO Coach and Adviser

Dan Smith

Executive Coach; Tech & Product Due Diligence and M&A Advisor

“It’s always about the people not the technology”

Emma Hopkinson-Spark

Chief of Staff at 101 Ways

Graham Hobson

Entrepreneur. Advisor. CTO. Founder of Photobox

Adelina Chalmers

CTO Strategic Advisor and Founder at The Geek Whisperer

Eric Weiss

CTO, Executive Coach, Speaker and Author

Sidharth Chugh

Director of Engineering at Ratepay, Former VP Engineering at ING Bank Deutschland and CTO Coach

Dennis Pannuto

Executive Technology Leader & Coach

Janet Kasdan

Fractional CTO & Digital Product Consultant

Susan Solomon

Coach - Senior Tech Executives

Paul Butcher

CTO. Technology Startup Veteran & Advisor. Author of Software Engineering Textbooks

Sebastian Galonska

Former CTO and Co-Founder at Kontist

David Yakimischak

Chief Technology Officer

Jeffrey Fredrick

CTO and Head of Product & Marketing at TIM Group

Stephan Schmidt

CTO Coach

Rod Alderton

Founder and Director Alderton Digital LTD

James Conroy-Finn

Founder, Invetica

Edoardo Turelli

Exited Founder/CTO • Advisor • Consultant • Coach • CTO

I’ve been part of $30m fundraisings, built world record-breaking deeptech and led multiple scaleups.

Jossie Haines

Executive Coach/Former VPE of Tile

Steve Mushero

Fractional CTO • Advisor • Former CEO, CTO

Kirsten Achtelstetter

Advisor. Coach. Fractional CTO. Founder at North Star Advisory

Robbie Clutton

Fractional CTO, Coach and Advisor

James O’Halloran

Business Coach and Founder, Sweet.Work

James Cook

Executive Leadership & Culture Coach

Jo Rabin

CTO, Advisor, Coach

Anton Kireev

Co-Founder & CTO at Muj Fres

Ashutosh Saxena

VP of Technology at &Open

Francis Lacoste

VPE Coach, former senior engineering leader at Salesforce and Heroku

Kimberly Lowe-Williams

Advisor/Mentor/Coach & Director of Engineering

Tom Sturge

CTO at Mohtas Media

Markus Böge

CTO, B2B SaaS Product Development Coach & Advisor

Geoff Watts

Business and Personal Coach to ambitious leaders

What You'll Learn

Design, Build & Debug Engineering Culture

Build Leadership and Team-building Skills

Vision, values and goal-setting
Hiring, on-boarding, retention, development and motivation
Meetings, 1:1s and time management
Teamwork, collaboration and team building
Stakeholders and upward management
Stress and burnout
Feedback, delegation and decision-making

Learn More

Architect & Maintain Quality Technology Products

Learn how to Plan and Build Products the Right Way

Software architecture and engineering practices
Platforms and technologies
Security and data privacy
Research and development
Data engineering and science
Quality assurance

Learn More

Create Sustainable Operations, Process & Infrastructure

Bullet-proof Ops, Project Management Processes and Secure Platforms

Product management and roadmapping
Process and release planning, Agile and Lean
Infrastructure, performance and ops
Continuous integration and release management
Disaster recovery and business continuity planning
Budgets and resource planning
Security, governance and risk

Learn More

Want to chat about joining a Circle?

If you'd like to know more about the benefits of joining a Circle, the kinds of conversation you'll have, the support you'll gain from being part of a group, and so on, click below and fill in your details to arrange a chat.

Commitment and Costs

Membership of a Circle costs £2999 per year, which includes full access to Campus. We ask for a commitment of 12 months in order to build trust and coherence in the group, and to ensure every member has an opportunity to speak about issues that are important to them.