100%
of retained searches filled — every one since 2015
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FinTech executive search · New York CityTechnology leadership search for New York's FinTech scaleups.
Retained CTO, VP Engineering and Chief AI Officer search for VC and PE-backed FinTech companies in New York: regulated, high-stakes platforms where the technical bar and the governance bar are both real. One market, one discipline, and a record we'll show you before you commit to anything.
96%
of 50+ placements since 2015 still in role at 12 months
30 days
typical time to a secured hire from engagement
12 months
replacement guarantee as standard, whatever the reason
Measured across 50+ retained searches Edison Hill has run since 2015.
The FinTech brief
Where the technical bar and the governance bar are both real.
A FinTech platform is regulated and high-stakes. The technical bar and the governance bar are both real, and the leader you appoint has to clear both.
AI sharpens the point. As Warren put it in his October 2026 market update: for a Series B FinTech, accelerating development may be valuable, but not if increased output introduces unacceptable reliability, security or regulatory risks. The right technology leader needs to understand both sides of that equation. AI may increase engineering capacity; leadership determines whether that capacity creates value.
That is why the search starts with the business challenge, not the job title. The CTO who built the first version of a platform is not necessarily the one to lead it through institutional customers, more complex operations and greater regulatory expectations. A successful appointment is not the best CTO in the market; it is the best CTO for the business at its particular stage of development.
The roles
- Chief Technology Officer: first-time and successor appointments
- VP Engineering: scaling delivery under investor timelines
- Chief AI Officer: a new seat at the table for most boards
- Director of Engineering and the leadership layer beneath the CTO
Case-style example
Representative case — Series B FinTech, NYC
A Series B payments company had grown engineering from 8 to 30 in under a year under its original founding CTO, who was strong technically but had never managed past a dozen people and was increasingly the bottleneck on every architectural decision.
The search targeted candidates who had specifically been the second technical leader brought in to scale a team past a founder-led ceiling, rather than founding CTOs themselves — a different pattern of experience than the company's own leadership history.
The placed candidate had run a 25-to-70 engineer scale-up at a prior fintech, and restructured the team into pods with embedded ownership within the first quarter, freeing the original founder-CTO to move into a Chief Architect role.
Company details anonymized. Available with named references on request.
From the Ascent phase brief of the CTO Phase Assessment. The named case studies are on the case studies page.
How the search runs
Four steps, run the same way every time.
The consistency is what produces the number. Skip a step and the 96% is just a claim.
01
Behavioural job survey
We get every hiring stakeholder aligned on what “right” actually means — before a single candidate is approached.
02
Deep market mapping
The whole addressable market, mapped and screened — not a shortlist drawn from whoever happens to be looking.
03
Competency-based screening
Structured, video-based assessment against the agreed brief, so every candidate is measured the same way.
04
Onboarding & retention
The search doesn’t end at the offer. It ends when the hire is embedded — which is why they’re still there at 12 months.
Straight answers
Hiring a FinTech technology leader in New York.
Do you only place CTOs in FinTech?
No. CTO, VP Engineering and Chief AI Officer, plus the senior technology leadership around them: Director of Engineering and the layer beneath the CTO. We deliberately do not cover every technology role; the concentration is the point.
How long does a FinTech CTO search take?
Typically your new hire is secured within 30 days of engaging us. The variable is rarely the market; it is how quickly the hiring group can agree what they are actually looking for, which is why we front-load that work with a behavioural job survey across every stakeholder.
What happens if the hire doesn’t work out?
Every placement carries a 12-month replacement guarantee as standard — if they leave, for any reason, we run it again. In practice it’s rarely called on: 96% of the people we place are still in role 12 months later.
Hiring a technology leader for a FinTech business?
Fifteen confidential minutes on the role and the market. No pitch deck.