An experienced technology executive and trusted adviser to founders, CTOs and boards.
I coach technology leaders, advise boards and help founders make consequential decisions, and I lead companies through growth, transitions and acquisitions. My experience includes engineering leadership at the BBC and two exits: my own business, Fill My Weekend, and Remo, where I led technology through its acquisition.
Discuss an engagement See how I can help
Tell me what you’re working through. We can explore whether there’s a fit and discuss scope and timing.
Who I help
Founders, CTOs, heads of engineering and boards, usually at a moment that matters. You do not need to diagnose the problem first. See the situations where I am often useful.
Already have a CTO? Good.
I work alongside existing CTOs and engineering leaders as a trusted peer, and take on fractional or interim leadership when it is needed.
The remit and reporting line are agreed with your CTO first, and they stay in charge of technology. I support their decisions with the board and the team rather than going around them, and I leave them stronger, not replaced. Coaching and supporting CTOs.
Experience and judgement
Figures describe the organisations and teams I led. Read the case studies, including what the figures do not show.
- CTO at Remo Through hypergrowth, contraction and acquisition by Events.com. Infrastructure and vendor spend cut by more than 80% over 14 months.
- BBC News and World Service Led a 50-person engineering team for an audience of 400 million, and served on the board overseeing digital strategy across the BBC.
- Interim CTO at Festicket Took over from the founding CTO and scaled the team from 3 to 17 through more than 1,000% revenue growth.
| Organisation | What changed |
|---|---|
| RemoCTO, 2021 to 2024. Events and remote-office SaaS | Led a 24/7 engineering organisation spanning GMT−8 to GMT+8 through pandemic hypergrowth, contraction and acquisition by Events.com. Cut infrastructure and vendor spend by more than 80% over 14 months, achieved approximately 99.99% uptime with recovery from live-event failures in under one minute, and achieved SOC 2 and ISO 27001. |
| BBCSenior Engineering Manager, 2017 to 2021. News and World Service | Led a 50-person engineering team for an audience of 400 million people, sharing a £9M budget in a leadership trio. Moved a PHP monolith from on-premises servers to AWS with better than 99.99% uptime, and rolled out HTTPS and a Tor mirror for audiences under censorship. |
| FesticketInterim CTO, 2015 to 2017. The UK's sixth fastest-growing startup | Took over technical leadership from the founding CTO, scaled the team from 3 to 17 through Series B and C, and reengineered the platform to support substantial increases in concurrent demand during a period of more than 1,000% revenue growth. |
| DeepnoteFractional CTO. YC-backed, $23.5M raised | Moving the product from a data science platform to an agentic AI workspace, raising AI-native engineering standards and improving enterprise delivery. Server costs cut by 40%. |
How I work alongside people and teams
Within one relationship I might advise the board, coach a leader and help engineers change how work gets done. These often overlap.
- Improving delivery and developer experience
- CI/CD, fast feedback loops and sound engineering practices, and removing the friction that stops good people doing good work.
- Coaching across the organisation
- Founder-to-founder and CEO-to-CEO conversations, supporting CTOs and heads of engineering, and working directly with engineers.
- Making analytics central to observability
- Starting from what customers experience and what the business needs to know, then working back to the product signals, instrumentation, reliability, testing and delivery practices that support them.
- Connecting decisions with the work
- Turning board and leadership decisions into plans, team changes and engineering practice, and following them through.
Quality and observability, from the outcome backwards
Observability is more than infrastructure dashboards, and quality is more than test coverage. Product analytics and operational evidence should shape priorities and decisions.
Define a good outcome
What good looks like for customers and for the business, in plain terms.
Decide how we will know
The product analytics and operational evidence that show whether it is happening.
Work backwards
Improve the product, systems and engineering practices that move that evidence, and let it set priorities.
Calm in messy phases
Scaling, contraction and leadership changes are rarely tidy. I bring steady leadership when the pressure is highest.
Trust first
I build high-trust relationships with founders and technology leaders, and I tell you plainly what I see, including when I am not the right person.
Commercial judgement
Every technology decision is a business decision. I connect engineering choices to customers, cost, risk and the next stage of the company.
Leaving you stronger
Lean, repeatable practices and leaders of your own, so the organisation keeps improving after I step back.
How we start
We start with a focused look at what you’re trying to achieve, what’s getting in the way, and how I could help. From there, we agree whether there’s a useful role for me and what it should involve.
- Understanding the business and what you are trying to achieve
- Meeting the people who matter to the work
- Looking at enough evidence to see where I could be useful
- Deciding together whether an ongoing role makes sense, and what it should be
Questions
For longer answers on technology leadership, delivery, costs and AI, see all 23 answers.
What does James Hobbs do?
James Hobbs is a technology executive, founder and trusted adviser based in London. He coaches CTOs and heads of engineering, advises boards, partners with founders on consequential technology decisions, and leads companies through growth, transitions and acquisitions, including as a fractional or interim CTO.
Do you work with companies that already have a CTO?
Yes. Much of my work is alongside an existing CTO: as a trusted peer, as additional leadership capacity, or by taking ownership of one difficult initiative. The remit is agreed with them first, and they stay in charge of technology.
Do you coach CTOs and heads of engineering?
Yes. I routinely coach and mentor founding CTOs, established CTOs and heads of engineering, through new roles, growth, board conversations and difficult decisions.
Do you work with boards?
Yes. I advise boards and present to them on technology strategy, investment, capability and risk. That is different from a statutory appointment as a director, which we can discuss separately.
How do we start?
We start with a focused look at what you’re trying to achieve, what’s getting in the way, and how I could help. From there, we agree whether there’s a useful role for me and what it should involve.
How are fees agreed?
Privately. Scope, fees and timing depend on what you need, so we agree them once we both understand the situation.
Where do you work?
I am based in London and work remotely with clients in the UK, Europe and North America, with time on site where it helps.