Product, Engineering & the CTO office
Generation Z, people born after 1995, are our first ‘digital natives’ and are pragmatic and financially minded – the exact Product Management skillset required to identify markets and design successful technology value propositions.
Sources: The Annie E. Casey Foundation, Indeed Recruitment.
© Bruce Mars
Should you trust a 26-year old to deploy your capital?
Product Management, Engineering and the CTO office all drive long-term shareholder value through the optimal use of technology. But the roles exist for very different reasons: Product Management designs, Engineering develops and the CTO office optimises.
Product Management is a commercial function, focused on identifying market opportunities, designing products and services to generate revenues, and building assets for the next capital event. Products do not have to be proprietary: if someone else’s kit can give better ROI, then that’s the answer.
Engineering’s role is to develop technology, from entire product suites to single components that integrate third-party solutions into operational processes. Whilst Product Management determines what and when to develop, Engineering is responsible for balancing resources, time frames and quality.
The CTO team maximises operational performance of all technology, proprietary and third-party, whilst minimising the cost of operations. They are the champions of innovation, optimising through architecture design and infrastructure configuration.
CTO and Engineering are often combined in smaller companies for efficiency and performance.
