I was the technical co-founder of my startup so naturally, I became the CTO.
I was great as an individual contributor, but as a team lead, I’ve felt completely lost, demotivated, and feel like I am not the right fit for the job. It’s very taxing and managing people is draining me completely, and none of the projects since we hired more people under me have been delivered on time (months late), which I believe is due to my incompetence.
I don’t feel like I can keep doing this work much longer. I’m an emotional Trainwreck. There’s a lot of knowledge I don’t have and I don’t have time for me to learn. What should I do?
Have you ever thought of having a coach to help you work on your self-esteem and personal development?
Hire a coach or find a mentor as the commenter above me suggested.
If you can’t or won’t, don’t feel bad to step down as CTO and take a position as lead engineer. Not everybody is made to lead and that’s no shame. But as a co-founder you have a responsibility towards the other founders and the company.
remember that most likely you’re the best your company has. Don’t compare to others and delegate!
Do your best. it’s going to keep getting better. it’s not a matter of how much you know but if you can provide technology support for your company.
Your team is there to help you. Delegate. if the team is bringing you down – change it.
Be aware of imposter syndrome and stop crying.
Check this out:
http://darkagilemanifesto.org/
http://programming-motherfucker.com/
Keep it real, don’t let bullshit eat you 😉
Hey!
I work as a coach and I get you. The most likely reason you feel this way is that you have a bias towards taking charge and delegating actions, and also you have somewhat a fear of conflicts and doesn’t want to step on any toes.
This is completely normal and it happens because your current binary poles are unbalanced. Which means that these type of activities is something you don’t associate your current personality as. Thus when you’re forced to do them they stand in direct conflict with who you believe yourself to be. In order to solve this, you have to find and connect to the emotional bias that is holding you back.
I specialize in doing this. You can find me here:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/oscarnygren/