If your team needs a skill that would take a new hire months to learn, I can help you find someone who already has it.
I start from the problem the new person will own, help you find people who have solved it before, and join the technical interviews myself. Then I stay through their first weeks while they settle in.
90-minute call, $500. Refundable in one click.
- A job post for your exact problem
- Candidates you can't tell apart
- A project waiting on one skill
- A job post that's specific
- Knowing who can do the work
- A project moving again
What I usually find
Why a new hire takes months
A good developer who hasn't solved this kind of problem before can learn it, but they learn it on your project. That's usually where the months go, and a lot of the risk too, because decisions about quality and architecture get made while they're still learning.
Before anyone writes a job post
I look at the work the new person will do: the architecture, the stack, the team they'll join, and the stage the product is at. That tells me what experience to look for. A job post that says “great machine learning engineer” vs “a machine learning engineer who has worked on audio models, and plays a musical instrument” can turn a 3-month project into a 3-week sprint.
Four very different roles
At a New York based VoIP company, I got stalled work moving again across several products at once, and part of that was hiring for the gaps: database, Go, QA, and AI roles.
Some of the work
A New York based VoIP company had spent nine months on an AI project that was moving at a crawl: self-hosting ASR models and LLMs for transcribing and summarizing calls, to keep costs down at scale. I recruited the right specialists, and it shipped in two months. I also drove the GPU batch-processing optimizations.
On a client's telehealth platform, the development team was 13 people across three countries. Over three years I helped bring it down to a remote team of four, by simplifying the architecture and the tech stack, upskilling the team, improving the process, and automating what we could. Less overhead made delivery twice as fast.
Clients stay unnamed here. I'm happy to walk you through any of these on a call.
How I work
What I look at first
What you're trying to achieve, and where things really stand. The quality of the work so far, and how the ground reality compares with how it feels to you. That can go either way: sometimes the work is worse than it looks, and sometimes it's much better than it feels, simply because it isn't finished yet. The skills the job needs against the skills on the team. Whether your timeline and budget estimates are realistic. And the gap between what I hear from leadership and what I hear from the people doing the work. That gap usually tells me the most.
Progress everyone can see
Status updates that say what's really done, in enough detail to act on, and a working build you can try every week. A lot of the misunderstandings I see start with updates that skip the details.
People who've solved it before
I look for people and tools that have already solved the exact problem you're struggling with, not just a good developer, a good marketing team, or a good CRM. A job post that says “great machine learning engineer” vs “a machine learning engineer who has worked on audio models, and plays a musical instrument” can turn a 3-month project into a 3-week sprint.
A team that doesn't need me
Knowledge moves to your team, and if you need a full-time CTO, I help you find the right one. By then, no part of your product should depend on one person, including me.
How we'd start
Everything starts with one paid call. By the end of it, we'll both know whether there's more to do, and which of the other two options fits.
A first call
- 90 minutes with me, working on your actual problem.
- Real answers and clear next steps on the calls themselves.
- Up to two follow-ups, with you or the people on your team.
- If it wasn't worth it, one click refunds the full $500.
The right first step for nearly everyone.
Some teams take the solutions and run with them on their own. That's a perfectly good outcome.
A fixed-price review
A close look at the work, your team, and the skills that are missing, over two to three weeks.
- The work ahead, and the skills it needs against the skills on your team
- The experience each missing role really needs
- Solutions to the problems we find, worked out together with you and your team
Your fractional CTO
A few hours a week, on your side of the table, while you find the people you're missing. The monthly range depends on how much of my time you need.
- Advising on each search and joining the technical interviews
- Help through each new person's first weeks, until they've settled in
- A planned hand-off to your own team
Bootstrapped and pre-revenue? Book a 40-minute Founder Call for $200. It doesn't include follow-up calls, and the same one-click refund applies.
Fair questions
Because it's working time on your problem, and you get real answers on the call itself. It also covers up to two follow-ups, including calls with people on your team if needed.
If you already know exactly who you need, a recruiter is the cheaper option. I help when the hard part is working out who you need, and telling who can really do the work.
No. I help you find the people you're missing and join the technical interviews, so you can see who can really do the work. They join your team, not mine. They're on your payroll and work under your direction.
I stay involved through their first weeks, so problems show up early and get dealt with before they grow.
Book your first call
Pick a time that works for you. Bring whoever on your team knows the work best.
$500 for the first call
- 90 minutes with me, working on your actual problem.
- Real answers and clear next steps on the calls themselves.
- Up to two follow-ups, with you or the people on your team.
- If it wasn't worth it, one click refunds the full $500.
Need more than one person? Rawzor is my firm, a small senior team of experts that works alongside your people. Explore rawzor.com →