Fractional CTO

Senior technical leadership, without the full-time hire

Does any of this sound familiar?

“We have developers, but nobody owns the roadmap.”

“Our last technical lead left, and nothing has shipped since.”

“Every vendor says their AI will change everything. Who do we believe?”

You probably don't need a full-time CTO.

You need a few hours a week from someone who has been making these decisions for over twenty years, and who still writes code.

What a Fractional CTO does

A Fractional CTO is the senior technical owner your company is missing, on a part-time retainer instead of a full-time salary.

I take ownership of the technical decisions: what to build, what to buy, who to hire, which vendor to trust, and where AI genuinely fits versus where it's just a demo.

Your developers get someone to escalate to. Your leadership gets straight answers in plain English. And you get someone accountable for the whole picture, not just this week's tickets.

This is a good fit if you:

Have a product or an in-house dev team, but no senior technical owner.
Are a non-technical founder or executive who needs a translator you can trust.
Have finished a Software Project Audit and want someone to own the fixes.
Are deciding how AI fits into your product and don't want to bet on a vendor's slide deck.

This is not a good fit if you:

Need someone in the office five days a week.
Want a full-time hire and are only looking to fill the gap for a month.
Need a specialist in a narrow field like embedded firmware or hardware design.

A fixed block of hours each month, starting at a few hours a week
Technical roadmap ownership
Architecture and code review
Hiring and vendor decisions
AI strategy and build-vs-buy calls
Reachable when things break
Remote, with on-site visits available ¹

Why me, and not another Fractional CTO?

Most fractional CTOs built their careers before LLMs existed, and it shows in their advice.

I've been building with the OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google APIs since the day each one was released. The portfolio is real, working software that I wrote myself, not a list of clients I once advised.

I also have a Bachelor of Mathematics in Computer Science from the University of Waterloo, a business degree, and a Project Management Professional (PMP®) certification. That's an unusual combination, and it's exactly what this role needs: someone who can review a pull request in the morning and defend the budget in the afternoon.

And you get me. Not a firm, not a bench of associates. If you've read the home page, you already know how I think.

How it works

1. We talk

A short call to understand your team, your product, and what's stuck. If it's not a fit, I'll tell you and point you somewhere better.

2. I look under the hood

Most engagements start with a Software Project Audit so the first month is spent on the real problems, not the reported ones. If you already know what's wrong, we can skip straight ahead.

3. We agree on a retainer

A fixed block of hours each month, sized to what you actually need. Engagements start at $4,000 per month and scale up with the hours. Scope is written down, and we review it together every quarter.

4. Things start shipping

Decisions get made, the roadmap gets owned, and your team has someone to ask. You get a plain-English summary every month of what changed and why.

Decades of Experience

I founded Syllogistic Software in 2003 and have spent my entire career building software and managing software projects.

I've led teams, rescued projects, and shipped products across a lot of industries. Since 2022 I've spent most of my time building AI-powered software, which means I know first-hand what works, what doesn't, and what it costs.

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Let's Talk

Tell me about your team and what's stuck, and I'll tell you honestly whether I can help: contact@sylsft.com

Have a question that hasn't been answered here? Check the FAQ.

¹ On-site visits incur an extra charge and travel cost reimbursement. Please contact me for an estimate.