What is the difference between a CTO, a technical director and a technical manager?

What is the difference between a CTO, a technical director and a technical manager?

Recently, the CTO's story on the circle of friends has been swiped all over the screen, and it has really become popular again.

Probably the CTO of a C-round financing medical website was resigned. And the CTO is a big V and WeChat account. As soon as this matter came out, there were voices of support and opposition in the WeChat group. Those who support the resignation of this CTO believe that he does not have a Review program at work, and he does not write code himself, but is keen to appear in technical conferences and write lace news in the Internet circle. The reason for the CTO side is that he has been deeply involved in entrepreneurship for many years, and the option returns have come to nothing.

You and I are not people who eat melons. Different roles have different interests and definitely have different attitudes on this matter. As an experienced technical driver, today I would like to talk with you about the difference between these three roles.

Programmer
Programmer , English name coder/programmer, people often laugh at themselves as the stage of code farmers. This role is responsible for realizing the requirement or product as a software product available to users.

This position is executive level. In addition, because of less experience, it is generally necessary to ask others for help, or to complete a task with others.

This stage will take about 3 years. The responsibilities of the programmer are as follows:

1. Responsible for the design and development of the company's operating system

2. Operational data processing and analysis

Senior programmer
Senior programmer name engineer. At this level, the English name can be changed to engineer or developer. At this time, your skills begin to increase, which is inseparable from your usual accumulated efforts. Congratulations.

At this time, you can not only complete the task, but also start to pay attention to the quality of the code, and be able to write industrial-grade code.

Your experience can be competent for module-level system design, undertake more complex technologies, be able to effectively self-manage, and have the ability to help others solve problems quickly (trouble shooting).

At this stage, you need to experience about 7 or 8 years of experience, and in the middle you need to go through a process of profound self-experience.

Sometimes the fatal blow is actually a little thief in my heart. Most people encounter a threshold around 5 years ago, when they hit the ceiling + hesitation period, or if you don’t like programming in your heart, you can try to change to other roles, such as product manager, pre-sales and after-sales support, etc. It is also a good choice.

When we get through this period, "the mountains will follow the plains, and the river will flow into the great wilderness", and it will gradually get better.

Senior programmers define software functions, do development plan promotion and management. You can bring a few helpers to realize the function of product planning. You are the "big hand" in the team, and you will overcome the difficulties yourself.

Therefore, a senior programmer, his responsibilities are very clear:

1. Responsible for the program design and coding implementation of the core complex functions of the product

2. Responsible for the analysis and diagnosis of difficult bugs, and tackling key problems.

Architect
At the architect level, you must have learned to subdue dragons and ten Eight palms can enter the WTO and become a quasi (lao) professional (you) home (tiao).

We shouted: "Fighting alone, no one is afraid of the old man!", and then began to lead a group of technical experts, instructing martial arts, to design and complete a system, most of which are distributed, high-concurrency system architecture platforms.

The task of an architect is to provide high-quality technical solutions to business problems of a company's products. There may be an architect for each product line, or the backend of multiple product lines may be provided by a platform designed by an architect.



Through some of the above achievements of the architect, his responsibilities are summarized as follows:

1. Requirement analysis: "Knowing the enemy" is sometimes more important than "knowing the past". Manage demand for markets, products, etc. to identify key requirements. Adhere to the unification of the vision of technical excellence and demand, improve the awareness of technical liabilities, and provide solutions such as technical options, risk prediction, and construction period.

2. Architecture design: Extract the central and non-functional requirements from product functions, and change from key requirements to conceptual architecture. List the function tree and rule it by layers, such as user interface layer, system interaction layer, and data management layer. Achieve high expansion, high availability, high performance, high security, easy operation and maintenance, easy deployment, easy access and other capabilities.

3. Functional design and implementation: the implementation of the underlying code level of the architecture design. Such as public core classes, interface implementation, application discovery rules, interface changes, etc.

Technical Manager
Life is an upward process, and you have reached the level of a manager. Today, you need to continuously improve your leadership, and you need to hold regular team meetings to discuss issues.

First of all, we must be more confident, show our skills at work, and add strength to speech. For example: "Although this project has great difficulties, we also need to fight hard to the end. Of course, we can succeed by setting an example and leading the way!"

You need to stand with everyone, because people also have the ability to solve problems, and more The following abilities and responsibilities are required:

1. Task management: evaluation of development workload, establishing development process, assigning and tracking development tasks

2. Quality management: code review, development risk judgment/reporting/coordinating solution

3. Efficiency improvement: bottom layer of code R&D and training, summary and promotion

of best code practice specifications, automated production tools, automated deployment tools , there are multiple product lines or the business volume is very large, at this time there are already multiple technical managers in charge of each business, then a technical director is needed. Responsibilities of the technical director: 1. Set up a platform R&D department and build a public software platform with architects to facilitate the research and development of various product business lines. 2. Manage and coordinate the various departments of the company and the various lines of the department through the technical platform and the authority of the higher level. Every product line should now have qualified technical managers and senior programmers.










CTO
Chief Technology Officer, English name Chief Technology Officer. He is a leader at the same level as the CEO, COO, and CFO, and a leader in the integration of technology and business.

The definition of CTO at home and abroad is slightly different.

The responsibility of the CTO in the United States is to design the technical development direction of the company's products and services within three years, and is less involved in the daily management and project management of the technical team. It is basically forward-looking strategic thinking. For example, Sergey Brin of Google has always kept a keen eye on the direction of technology, such as driverless cars and artificial intelligence.

In China, most CTOs focus on R&D management, which is equivalent to the Plus version of technical directors. It is equivalent to the work union of the permanent engineer vice president + CTO of the American Internet company. But the overall situation is lower than that of CTOs in the United States. Most CTOs lead technical teams to develop various products, solve technical problems, manage different projects, and schedule delivery. Another part of the function is similar to the architect or chief engineer. As the authority on the technical side, it conducts research and discussion for the next development direction and provides the CEO with a reference for constructive decision-making.

The responsibilities of the CTO are listed below:

1. Technology Vision: Identify new technologies, utilize new technologies, integrate new technologies, and drive new technologies. Drive business strategy, drive product strategy
2. Technical structure: establish the technical structure and implementation mode in the main business, establish technical system standards
3. Process system: establish a high-quality and efficient technical team. Sound project management system; perfect employee ability development system
4. Knowledge training: establish a knowledge base management system based on R&D content, technology sharing and technology culture system
5. Business support: communication and cooperation with other departments, such as HR , market, BD, finance, customer service, etc. to provide technical management interfaces; can lead the industry in terms of product technology
6. Influence: have a certain influence and reputation within the company and in the industry
7. Vision & Pattern & Execution: A comprehensive view of problems, strong learning ability, technical
foresight
. Summary:

What the CTO does is the comprehensive management of business, product, technology, management, and team balance. The company's technology research and development direction and the results of key commercialization are responsible for motivating employees and creating an engineer culture.

The technical director is mainly responsible for coordinating various resources within the team, introducing tools, and methods to improve work efficiency.

The technical manager's role is relatively specific, performance appraisal, product implementation, and the implementation of the rules of survival of the fittest.

Just like "The Road Less Traveled", everyone's growth path is different, but all are driven by interest and mission - whether you are a programmer, a technical manager, or a CTO role. Let's work together to develop our potential to meet the unexpected challenges and the wonderful scenery after victory.

Sharing is a virtue :)