Product and engineering teams carry different definitions of done and different owners, and there’s nobody in the role between them who can hold both. The senior hire, whether a head of engineering, a chief product officer, or a combined CPTO, has to hold both definitions of done and the tension between them in the same role.
What product and engineering tension looks like when engineering wins every argument
When engineering wins every argument, architecture shapes the roadmap and product requests are tested against technical risk until each change adds a sprint, so delivery slows without an obvious breakage and the product managers who can’t get anything shipped leave.
What product and engineering tension looks like when product wins every argument
When product wins every argument, the backlog wins, which means every customer request gets prioritised, engineering is treated as delivery capacity with tech debt never funded, and the platform gets slower, the data gets messier, and the best engineers start leaving.
When product wins every argument, the roadmap moves and the platform debt accumulates, and the search has to test whether the person can fund the rebuild without stopping the roadmap, because the cost otherwise appears later as a stability incident, a slow rebuild, or a due diligence finding that the platform and product narrative have come apart.
The brief usually misses the hard part
Most specs for these roles are written by one function about the other. A chief product officer spec describes product metrics and commercial outcomes. A head of engineering PD describes technical maturity and platform risk. Neither describes the job of holding the two together.
The difficult part of the role sits in the moments where product and engineering disagree and someone has to make the call that serves the business, not just one side. A spec that lists delivery metrics, team size and tooling but doesn’t ask what the person did the last time moving fast and building for the long term pointed in opposite directions is a spec for one half of the role.
Product engineering alignment is the role you’re hiring for
Our track record includes combined chief product and technology roles in a PE-backed comparison and switching platform and in a PE-backed technology business, alongside a separate head of engineering search in an Australian mortgage insurance business and a head of technology search in a PE-backed legal and conveyancing business, which is the shape of the combined and separate roles we’ve run. A combined title doesn’t solve the problem, though. A leader with both product and engineering accountability has to be able to translate commercial need into technical trade-offs and technical risk into commercial terms, in the same conversation, with the board and with the team.
The search should test for the last time the person had to choose speed over architecture and what they gave up, and the last time they had to choose architecture over speed and what they protected.
Frequently asked questions
The senior hire is the relationship between the two functions, and when the spec names only one side of it, the search tests for the wrong half of the job. If you’re scoping a head of engineering hire, a product leadership search, or a combined CPTO role, start with the moment where the two functions collide, and what you need that person to do with it.
