There are of course different rules at different scales for a company. But in general if you were engineer #1 becoming a CTO and your team can't function and go

There are of course different rules at different scales for a company. But in general if you were engineer #1 becoming a CTO and your team can't function and govern autonomously once its reached a size where you step away from daily commits, you have failed to grow a competent tech lead for the role.