Who Decides—You or the Model?

Most teams “add AI” like a bolt-on tool. High-performing teams design the collaboration: who does what (human vs. model), where judgment lives, how handoffs happen, and how to audit outcomes. This guide gives you concrete patterns—decision rights, escalation paths, review checkpoints, and telemetry—so your AI copilots lift velocity and accountability, not risk.

Read the Human–AI Collaboration Design guide →

Did You Know?

Most AI “failures” aren’t model failures. Surveys show ~70% of AI initiatives deliver little or no impact, and analysts expect 40%+ of agentic AI projects to be scrapped by 2027—largely because the work wasn’t designed into the organization.

What breaks? Not math— decision rights, handoffs, and governance. Research points to unclear problem definitions, missing data ownership, and tools bolted on without workflow redesign as primary failure modes. Even in 2025, only ~1% of companies feel mature in workplace AI; the bottleneck is leadership and operating-model change.

The fix? Design the human–AI handshake first. How? Refer to the guide above. 

Spotlight

Future Leaders Course

For new managers and experienced tech leads


Whether you’re stepping into your first leadership role or formalizing hard-won experience as a tech lead, this upgraded course gives you the essentials to lead with confidence: strategy, business fluency, team performance, change, risk, and personal leadership. 

It’s 8 modules/~70 lessons in about 8 hours, CPD-certified, self-paced with lifetime access

Leave with a practical system to turn strategy into delivery and lead teams that ship.

Learn more about our Future Leaders Course →

Recommended reading

Guide

Risks You Can Actually Manage

From prompt exploits to runaway autonomy, this guide turns agentic AI worries into a practical control plan—scoping, guardrails, audit trails, and human-in-the-loop patterns you can deploy now.

Book

Lead Without the Guesswork

Plain-English frameworks, checklists, and real examples to turn business–tech tension into a productive partnership. Perfect for product leaders, founders, and execs who need to make better tech decisions and manage engineers with confidence.

Digital MBA for Technology Leaders

The next cohort launches on Monday, November 3.

Book Your Seat

"Spending several thousand euros and a few months on an online training isn’t something one does lightly -- there are plenty of ways such a long journey could disappoint. Nothing like that happened with CTO Academy. Andrew, Jason, and the team have done a monumental job assembling a thorough, well-structured, and up-to-date curriculum that truly covers everything a CTO needs to know.” - Andrei L., CTO ( Trustpilot, October 8, 2025
 

What's New

Download Your Lecture Notes

We're excited to announce a highly requested update: You can now download your personalized Lecture Notes as a PDF! 📝✨

We've made this change to give you more control and flexibility over your study materials.

How to Download:

  1. Navigate to your Lecture Notes section for any course. 📚
  2. Look for the new "Download as PDF" button (usually near the top). ⬇️
  3. Click it, and your file will be generated and saved to your device. 💻

This makes it simple to print 🖨️, archive 📂, or study your notes on the go! 🏃‍♀️ 

Program at a Glance

  • Impact over theory: Convert modules into outcomes—OKR-linked roadmaps, CFO-ready finance, shippable AI strategy, and execution systems that stick.
  • Built around your week: ~2.5 hrs/week, finish in 9–12 months with lifetime access to playbooks, templates, and recordings.
  • Practitioner faculty: Learn from leaders who’ve scaled teams and platforms—case-led sessions with feedback on your real work.
  • Coaching + peers: Weekly live sessions, AMAs, and structured peer reviews to de-risk your plans before rollout.
  • Proven with tech leaders worldwide: A track record of satisfaction and career acceleration across industries.
  • Membership included: 12 months of CTO Academy community access (debates, Q&As, peer support) from day one.
     

Questions? Book a short Discovery Call with our CEO to map the program to your goals.

CTO Community Pulse: Highlights

#Ask the Community

  • Recommendations wanted for senior IT recruiters in New York.
  • Input requested on temporary e2e testing solutions and viable alternatives.

#Tech

  • First-hand report from a fully autonomous taxi ride sparked debate on rollout timelines and regional readiness.

# Books • Pods • Articles

  • Reflections on career lessons, lists, and AI & diversity discussions from recent podcasts.
  • Notes from a book-in-progress review using LLM assistance.
  • Shares on agile transformation, AI’s job impact, and purpose-driven leadership essays.
  • A teardown of an £85k/month AI proposal showed that much didn’t actually require AI.

#Jobs Market

  • Community member relocating to Estonia and open to engineering leadership or developer roles.

#Wins of the Week

  • Industry cover feature recognition.
  • Hackathon gold for a generative-AI compliance solution.
  • Launch of a self-hosted property site with AI-assisted copy.
  • New role secured, with appreciation for community support.
  • Post-redundancy momentum: event rebrand delivered, media appearance, and podcast panel invite.

#New Members

  • A warm welcome to recent joiners from South Africa, the United States, the Netherlands, and Germany.

Upcoming CTO Academy Events

 

In-Person*

  • Oct 22 — Amsterdam: Tech Talks (canal cruise format)
  • Nov 27 — London: TBC

* Visit our Events page for details and reservations 

Online

  • Oct 21 — Implementing Agentic AI - with 50k running — Masterclass with Thomas Benjamin
  • Oct 28 — Modern IT Management - Panel Discussion — Masterclass with Catherine Warren
  • Nov 11 — CTO Academy October Peer-to-Peer Session #1 — Peer-to-Peer Session 


Recent Events

  • Managing Neurodiverse Teams — Community session with Anette Jacobs
  • Containing the Prompt: Managing AI's New Attack Surface — Masterclass with Jon Winterburn
  • Fractional CTO Community Meetup — Community session
  • How to Bring AI into Your Dev Team — Masterclass with Benedikt Stemmildt


Connect, contribute, iterate—turn conversations into career momentum.

Join us

From our recent Exclusive Tech Leadership Dinner in Valletta, Malta