A good CTO lives and dies on "soft skills". At two places I've been I've seen competent engineers with solid technical pedigree brought in as CTO and completely

A good CTO lives and dies on "soft skills". At two places I've been I've seen competent engineers with solid technical pedigree brought in as CTO and completely flounder since, for whatever reason, they could not get the managers below them to execute his (in my opinion very sensible) plans.