I've been doing interviews with Series B-D startups and one issue that seems to recur is a lack of management experience. Generally, an engineer gets promoted to some level of management, but never learns how to manage. Hard conversations aren't happening, feedback isn't constructive, and the people aspect is left to fend for itself. That's all on top of standard organization challenges like team structure.
Generally, I'd expect the CTO/VP/Director to have more management experience, but in a lot of these cases, they may have the resume, but not the skills.
Has anyone had a career from selling management coaching or consulting on these issues?
