I've collected a few titles over the years. Chief Technology Officer is the one on the business card. Dad and husband are the ones I've worked hardest at. But grandfather is the one that snuck up on me — and, if I'm honest, the one I like best.
Nobody warns you how much it rearranges you. You spend a career learning to solve problems, sequence projects, keep a hundred plates spinning — and then a very small person shows up whose entire job is to remind you that none of that was ever the point. The point was always the people. The rest is just how we pay for the time with them.
Those pines on my arm? Each one is a family member. It started as a way to carry them with me, and it's turned into a running tally of the best thing I've built — better than any network, any strategy, any system I'll ever stand up. The newest addition to the tree doesn't know a thing about egress speeds or ticket queues, and that is exactly as it should be.
I've spent a lot of years telling teams that culture matters, that you should know your people and never forget how you got here. I didn't invent that from a management book. I got it at home first — from the people who put up with the late nights and the on-call weekends, and who are still here on the other side of all of it.
So yeah. CTO is a fine title. Grandfather's better.
