/cto-review

name: "cto-review"
description: "/cs:cto-review <plan> — Architecture and scaling interrogation. Tech debt, scaling cliffs, team scaling, build-vs-buy. Use when committing to an architecture, planning for 10x load, or weighing a rebuild against a vendor."

/cs:cto-review — CTO Forcing Questions

**Command:** `/cs:cto-review <plan>`

Pressure-tests architecture and engineering scaling decisions. Six questions to surface the next scaling cliff before you hit it.

When to Run

• Before approving a major architecture change
• Before doubling the engineering team
• Before a build-vs-buy decision > $100K/year
• When a system is showing reliability stress (SLOs missed)
• Before committing to a new platform / language / DB

The Six CTO Questions

1. Scaling Cliff

**Where does the current architecture break, in terms of users / requests / data volume?**

• Be specific. "It breaks at 10× current load because the primary DB writes saturate."
• If you don't know, run a load test before deciding.

2. Tech Debt Inventory

**What's the top tech debt item, what's it costing per week, and when does it become blocking?**

python ../../../c-level-advisor/skills/cto-advisor/scripts/tech_debt_analyzer.py

3. Team Scaling

**For each open req, what's the ramp time and contribution model?**

python ../../../c-level-advisor/skills/cto-advisor/scripts/team_scaling_calculator.py

4. Build vs Buy

**Why are we building this instead of buying it — and what's the 3-year TCO of each?**

• If "we want control" or "it's not that hard" — push back.
• If the answer is "this is our core moat," build.

5. SLO / Reliability

**What are the SLOs for this system and what's the current error budget burn?**

• Without an SLO, you can't reason about reliability tradeoffs.
• See `engineering/slo-architect` for SLO design.

6. Security & Compliance Surface

**What does this expose, and has cs-ciso-advisor signed off?**

• Architecture decisions are compliance decisions.
• Loop in cs-ciso-advisor before commit.

Workflow

1. Run the tech debt analyzer + team scaling calculator 2. Define the scaling-cliff hypothesis explicitly 3. Cross-check with cs-ciso-advisor for security implications 4. Apply the verdict

Output Format

# CTO Review: <plan>
**Date:** YYYY-MM-DD

## Scaling Cliff
- Current capacity: <metric>
- Break point: <metric>
- Headroom: X months at current growth

## Tech Debt
- Top item: <description>
- Cost per week: $X or N eng-hours
- Blocking date estimate: <date>

## Team
- Open reqs: N
- Median ramp: X months
- Contribution model: <pairing / squad / area>

## Build vs Buy
- 3-year build TCO: $X
- 3-year buy TCO: $X
- Strategic fit: <core / context>
- Decision: BUILD | BUY

## Reliability
- SLO defined: yes / no
- Error budget burn: X% (target < Y%)

## Security
- cs-ciso sign-off: ✅ / ❌

## Verdict
🟢 SHIP | 🟡 SHARPEN | 🔴 BLOCK

## Next Steps
[3 concrete actions]

Routing

• `/cs:ciso-review` — mandatory if data surface changes
• `/cs:cfo-review` — for build-vs-buy > $100K
• `/cs:execute` — quarterly plan
• `/cs:boardroom` — for architecture pivots

Related

• Agent: [`cs-cto-advisor`](../../../agents/c-level/cs-cto-advisor.md)
• Skill: [`cto-advisor`](../../../c-level-advisor/skills/cto-advisor/SKILL.md)
• SLO: `../../../engineering/slo-architect/`

---

**Version:** 1.0.0