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How to hire a president & chief technology officer

President & chief technology officer hiring summary. Here are some key points about hiring president & chief technology officers in the United States:

  • In the United States, the median cost per hire a president & chief technology officer is $1,633.
  • It takes between 36 and 42 days to fill the average role in the US.
  • Human Resources use 15% of their expenses on recruitment on average.
  • On average, it takes around 12 weeks for a new president & chief technology officer to become settled and show total productivity levels at work.

How to hire a president & chief technology officer, step by step

To hire a president & chief technology officer, you should clearly understand the skills and experience you are looking for in a candidate, and allocate a budget for the position. You will also need to post and promote the job opening to reach potential candidates. Here's a step-by-step guide on how to hire a president & chief technology officer:

Here's a step-by-step president & chief technology officer hiring guide:

  • Step 1: Identify your hiring needs
  • Step 2: Create an ideal candidate profile
  • Step 3: Make a budget
  • Step 4: Write a president & chief technology officer job description
  • Step 5: Post your job
  • Step 6: Interview candidates
  • Step 7: Send a job offer and onboard your new president & chief technology officer
  • Step 8: Go through the hiring process checklist

What does a president & chief technology officer do?

A president and chief technology officer (CTO) is an executive-level position focusing on resolving the technical issues within an organization. His/Her or her duties and responsibilities include working with other strategists and technical planners to assess product demands in the market, formulating solutions to reduce dependency on external consultants, and making infrastructure and technology-related decisions. The requirements to qualify for the position include possessing good management and problem-solving skills and obtaining a bachelor's degree in computer science or other related fields.

Learn more about the specifics of what a president & chief technology officer does
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  1. Identify your hiring needs

    First, determine the employments status of the president & chief technology officer you need to hire. Certain president & chief technology officer roles might require a full-time employee, whereas others can be done by part-time workers or contractors.

    Determine employee vs contractor status
    Is the person you're thinking of hiring a US citizen or green card holder?

    You should also consider the ideal background you'd like them a president & chief technology officer to have before you start to hire. For example, what industry or field would you like them to have experience in, what level of seniority or education does the job require, and how much it'll cost to hire a president & chief technology officer that fits the bill.

    This list shows salaries for various types of president & chief technology officers.

    Type of President & Chief Technology OfficerDescriptionHourly rate
    President & Chief Technology OfficerComputer and information systems managers, often called information technology (IT) managers or IT project managers, plan, coordinate, and direct computer-related activities in an organization. They help determine the information technology goals of an organization and are responsible for implementing computer systems to meet those goals.$55-143
    Director Of Software DevelopmentA director of software development is primarily in charge of overseeing the workflow and the workforce involved in the entire software development process. Their responsibilities also include creating strategies for optimal performance, coordinating with different teams and departments to identify strengths and weaknesses, implementing training and workshop programs, and liaising with external agencies, including key clients... Show more$52-109
    Systems ManagerA systems manager is responsible for monitoring the operations of the information technology department, evaluating staff performance, developing strategic procedures to maximize productivity, and identifying business opportunities that would generate more revenues and profitability for the company. Systems managers inspect company networks to ensure the efficiency of the technology systems, conducting regular diagnostic tests, and installing upgrades to boost optimization... Show more$36-73
  2. Create an ideal candidate profile

    Common skills:
    • R
    • Architecture
    • CTO
    • Cloud
    • Product Development
    • Technology Strategy
    • Web Services
    • Service Delivery
    • Technology Infrastructure
    • Software Development
    • Application Development
    • C++
    • Business Plan
    • Intellectual Property
    Check all skills
    Responsibilities:
    • Define and manage development of a mobile-first solution for cloud streaming of digital content on a global scale.
    • Manage security audits to comply with federal security guidelines (HIPAA) and to exceed industry guidelines (SYSTRUST).
    • Manage multiple implementations over the years using different e-commerce platforms.
    • Manage organization's PMO and define standards using the PMI methodology for project/program management.
    • Recruit to manage all product development operations and oversee strategic product planning sessions, leading architecture and design meetings.
    • Manage all technological systems from concept to implementation, including systems architecture, specification, acquisition or development, and operation.
    More president & chief technology officer duties
  3. Make a budget

    Including a salary range in your president & chief technology officer job description is a great way to entice the best and brightest candidates. A president & chief technology officer salary can vary based on several factors:
    • Location. For example, president & chief technology officers' average salary in wyoming is 26% less than in massachusetts.
    • Seniority. Entry-level president & chief technology officers earn 62% less than senior-level president & chief technology officers.
    • Certifications. A president & chief technology officer with a few certifications under their belt will likely demand a higher salary.
    • Company. Working for a prestigious company or an exciting start-up can make a huge difference in a president & chief technology officer's salary.

    Average president & chief technology officer salary

    $186,281yearly

    $89.56 hourly rate

    Entry-level president & chief technology officer salary
    $115,000 yearly salary
    Updated January 21, 2026

    Average president & chief technology officer salary by state

    RankStateAvg. salaryHourly rate
    1Massachusetts$200,555$96
    2Texas$198,069$95
    3Washington$193,365$93
    4Colorado$185,084$89
    5California$184,959$89
    6Florida$176,265$85
    7New Jersey$175,687$84
    8Illinois$174,213$84
    9New York$171,587$82
    10Tennessee$163,695$79
    11Pennsylvania$159,072$76
    12North Carolina$154,832$74
    13Nebraska$154,660$74
    14Oklahoma$142,346$68

    Average president & chief technology officer salary by company

    RankCompanyAverage salaryHourly rateJob openings
    1Novant Health$228,957$110.0810
    2MetLife$215,808$103.7515
    3VMware$212,597$102.21
    4Lincoln Electric System$210,425$101.17
    5Smart Security Systems$205,843$98.96
    6Radian Group$205,106$98.611
    7Holy Name Medical Center$199,624$95.97
    8Ericsson$195,104$93.80
    9Angelica$194,816$93.66
    10Kasasa$185,782$89.321
    11Goldman Sachs$172,627$82.9985
    12Cherokee Nation Businesses$160,557$77.1914
    13MicroStrategy$146,264$70.323
    14Schneider Electric Industrial Services$118,168$56.812
  4. Writing a president & chief technology officer job description

    A good president & chief technology officer job description should include a few things:

    • Summary of the role
    • List of responsibilities
    • Required skills and experience

    Including a salary range and the first name of the hiring manager is also appreciated by candidates. Here's an example of a president & chief technology officer job description:

    President & chief technology officer job description example

    The Business and Role

    The Office of the CTO (OCTO) team plays a mission-critical role in shaping the technical vision for the company, advancing our research and development efforts, and driving innovation across VMware. It delivers an expanded internal-facing charter to drive the operational transformation of our R&D organization as we evolve to a cloud and SaaS-centric company with these three primary teams:

    Design/UX ensures great experiences that enhance our customers' ability to achieve their desired outcomes.

    VMware Platform Services is responsible for SaaS operational capabilities and many other common engineering functions. It ensures a horizontal approach that provides the foundational building blocks for all our SaaS services to deliver a common customer experience across business groups.

    Research and Innovation drives technology invention and innovation that advances the state of the art, catalyzes growth opportunities, collaborates across R&D to define and accelerate VMware's technology strategy, and engages externally with a variety of partners, customers, and communities to co-create the future of technology.

    The VP of User Experience drives the enterprise-wide product design, user research, developer experience, design systems, accessibility, and UI and API engineering teams. In this role, over 250 designers, design system developers, design program managers, accessibility engineers, and user researchers will report to you and work alongside their cross-functional partners to deliver end-to-end experiences for our customers, partners, and colleagues.

    This strategic, high impact, horizontal leadership role is the voice of design across VMware. You will be responsible for defining a common experience for our infrastructure, DevSecOps, networking, security, and endpoint device management enterprise customers and infusing a design thinking mindset into our product culture. In this role you will be a key member of the OCTO senior leadership team and closely collaborate with all our Business Groups and Business Units.

    Job Responsibilities
    • Clearly articulate a design vision and strategy to drive execution and consistency across the 15,000-person product organization while ensuring quality and velocity in decision making and delivery.
    • Champion and prioritize Design innovation, grounded in user research, to evolve a technology-driven R&D culture by adopting design thinking.
    • Influence how design and user research are included early in the product and service definition phases of the highly technical product domains for every business group.
    • Integrate more mature design processes that are used across the company to ensure that Design is deeply embedded to enable faster growth.
    • Grow a catalyzing organization that adapts quickly to a multi-cloud and modern application business model that is evolving our product portfolio to SaaS and subscription.
    • Champion product-led growth through strong design and research techniques, deeply integrated into VMware's software development lifecycle.
    • Inspire a bias for action, instill accountability, move fast, make new mistakes, learn from them, and grow.
    • Provide an inclusive and psychologically safe environment for designers, engineers, researchers, and accessibility professionals to grow and learn, to do their best work, and to collaborate with one another as well as with their cross-business group partners.
    • Lead interdisciplinary teams that deliver across the organization and build end-to-end experiences for multiple product and service teams - including accessibility, design engineering, developer experience and design systems.
    • Forge strong partnerships and build trust with GM's, cross functional VP's and leaders to evangelize User Experience across VMware.


    Key Job Requirements

    The ideal candidate is passionate about design and has a proven track record in driving transformational change across complex R&D organizations. They will possess deep understanding of User Centered Design, Accessibility, User Research, Design Systems, and Operational Excellence that comes from years of experience. They appreciate the need to bring analysis, creativity, and process to enable customer-centric user experience within R&D execution. They have a track record of collaborating with and influencing leaders in other areas of the business. They hold others accountable to the highest standards of performance and integrity. They understand how to ensure great design within enterprise software development. Other key attributes:

    • Excellent written, storytelling, and presentation skills.
    • Proven record of operating at an executive leadership level with budget responsibility.
    • Experience with SaaS enterprise product design and development.
    • Led large cross-functional user experience teams (200+) working on multiple product lines.
    • Built the foundational pieces of process and structure for a global user experience team with the demonstrated ability to develop scalable frameworks to solve complex business issues.
    • Experience building high-performance practices that enhance productivity.
    • Excellent analytical skills to leverage data into an understandable format for decision-making.
    • Ability to balance the demands of supporting a global team in multiple time zones and engaging appropriately.
    • Model VMware's EPIC2 values: Execution, Passion, Integrity, Customers, Community, and inspire and drive a high performing, diverse, and inclusive team.
    • Strong influencing skills and ability to work effectively across organizational boundaries.
    • Execution & results oriented.
    • Enjoys being challenged and stretched and is focused on continuous professional development and career progression.
    This job may require the candidate to travel and/or work from a facility that requires full vaccination prior to entry.

    VMware is an Equal Opportunity Employer and Prohibits Discrimination and Harassment of Any Kind: VMware is committed to the principle of equal employment opportunity for all employees and to providing employees with a work environment free of discrimination and harassment. All employment decisions at VMware are based on business needs, job requirements and individual qualifications, without regard to race, color, religion or belief, national, social or ethnic origin, sex (including pregnancy), age, physical, mental or sensory disability, HIV Status, sexual orientation, gender identity and/or expression, marital, civil union or domestic partnership status, past or present military service, family medical history or genetic information, family or parental status, or any other status protected by the laws or regulations in the locations where we operate. VMware will not tolerate discrimination or harassment based on any of these characteristics. VMware encourages applicants of all ages. VMware will provide reasonable accommodation to employees who have protected disabilities consistent with local law.

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  5. Post your job

    There are a few common ways to find president & chief technology officers for your business:

    • Promoting internally or recruiting from your existing workforce.
    • Ask for referrals from friends, family members, and current employees.
    • Attend job fairs at local colleges to meet candidates with the right educational background.
    • Use social media platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter to recruit passive job-seekers.
    Post your job online:
    • Post your president & chief technology officer job on Zippia to find and recruit president & chief technology officer candidates who meet your exact specifications.
    • Use field-specific websites.
    • Post a job on free websites.
  6. Interview candidates

    Recruiting president & chief technology officers requires you to bring your A-game to the interview process. The first interview should introduce the company and the role to the candidate as much as they present their background experience and reasons for applying for the job. During later interviews, you can go into more detail about the technical details of the job and ask behavioral questions to gauge how they'd fit into your current company culture.

    Remember to include a few questions that allow candidates to expand on their strengths in their own words. Asking about their unique skills might reveal things you'd miss otherwise. At this point, good candidates can move on to the technical interview.

    The right interview questions can help you assess a candidate's hard skills, behavioral intelligence, and soft skills.

  7. Send a job offer and onboard your new president & chief technology officer

    Once you've found the president & chief technology officer candidate you'd like to hire, it's time to write an offer letter. This should include an explicit job offer that includes the salary and the details of any other perks. Qualified candidates might be looking at multiple positions, so your offer must be competitive if you like the candidate. Also, be prepared for a negotiation stage, as candidates may way want to tweak the details of your initial offer. Once you've settled on these details, you can draft a contract to formalize your agreement.

    You should also follow up with applicants who don't get the job with an email letting them know that you've filled the position.

    Once that's done, you can draft an onboarding schedule for the new president & chief technology officer. Human Resources should complete Employee Action Forms and ensure that onboarding paperwork is completed, including I-9s, benefits enrollment, federal and state tax forms, etc. They should also ensure that new employee files are created for internal recordkeeping.

  8. Go through the hiring process checklist

    • Determine employee type (full-time, part-time, contractor, etc.)
    • Submit a job requisition form to the HR department
    • Define job responsibilities and requirements
    • Establish budget and timeline
    • Determine hiring decision makers for the role
    • Write job description
    • Post job on job boards, company website, etc.
    • Promote the job internally
    • Process applications through applicant tracking system
    • Review resumes and cover letters
    • Shortlist candidates for screening
    • Hold phone/virtual interview screening with first round of candidates
    • Conduct in-person interviews with top candidates from first round
    • Score candidates based on weighted criteria (e.g., experience, education, background, cultural fit, skill set, etc.)
    • Conduct background checks on top candidates
    • Check references of top candidates
    • Consult with HR and hiring decision makers on job offer specifics
    • Extend offer to top candidate(s)
    • Receive formal job offer acceptance and signed employment contract
    • Inform other candidates that the position has been filled
    • Set and communicate onboarding schedule to new hire(s)
    • Complete new hire paperwork (i9, benefits enrollment, tax forms, etc.)
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How much does it cost to hire a president & chief technology officer?

Before you start to hire president & chief technology officers, it pays to consider both the one-off costs like recruitment, job promotion, and onboarding, as well as the ongoing costs of an employee's salary and benefits. While most companies that hire president & chief technology officers pay close attention to the initial cost of hiring, ongoing costs are much more significant in the long run.

President & chief technology officers earn a median yearly salary is $186,281 a year in the US. However, if you're looking to find president & chief technology officers for hire on a contract or per-project basis, hourly rates typically range between $55 and $143.

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