
alphalist.CTO Podcast - For CTOs and Technical Leaders
This podcast features interviews of CTOs and other technical leadership figures and topics range from technology (AI, blockchain, cyber, DevOps, Web Architecture, etc.) to management (e.g. scaling, structuring teams, mentoring, technical recruiting, product etc.).
Guests from leading tech companies share their best practices and knowledge.
The goal is to support other CTOs on their journey through tech and engineering, inspire and allow a sneak-peek into other successful companies to understand how they think and act. Get awesome insights into the world‘s top tech companies, personalities with this podcast brought to you by Tobias Schlottke.
Latest episodes

Apr 17, 2025 • 1h 14min
#120 - AI's Singularity & Commoditization: Navigating Hype vs. Reality with Georg Zoeller // Co-Founder @ C4AIL
Georg Zoeller, Co-Founder of the Centre for AI Leadership and a former Meta expert, dives deep into the reality of AI's rapid evolution. He warns against the blind adoption of AI technologies, highlighting the risks of prompt injection and the economic strains facing the industry. The conversation touches on the commoditization of software engineering driven by vast training data, and Georg emphasizes the crucial need for CTOs to invest in understanding and governance. He also discusses geopolitical risks tied to Big Tech's influence and offers actionable advice for navigating this complex landscape.

Apr 4, 2025 • 57min
#119 - Navigating Ambiguity and AI's Impact on Engineering feat. Ivan Kusalic // CTO @ Enpal
Leading in ambiguous environments and the impact of AI on engineering practices
In this episode, Tobi talks with Ivan Kusalic, CTO of Enpal, who leads a team of 250 engineers at one of Germany's leading solar energy companies. Ivan shares insights from his extensive technical leadership journey and his recent return to coding after seven years due to his excitement about AI.
Ivan discusses how he navigates complexity and ambiguity in the renewable energy sector, where Enpal builds systems to help households manage solar panels, batteries, EV chargers, and heat pumps as integrated energy solutions. He explains the challenges of coordinating with Germany's fragmented energy grid infrastructure and how Enpal's Virtual Power Plant stabilizes the grid by coordinating household energy consumption in real-time.
Discover:
🧠 How Ivan uses intuition as a leadership tool while managing complex technical organizations
🌞 The technical challenges of building integrated renewable energy systems for households
⚡ How Enpal's Virtual Power Plant (VPP) helps stabilize the energy grid through coordinated home energy management
📱 Ivan's personal productivity system and thought management techniques
🤖 Insights on AI's impact on engineering productivity and the future of coding
🚀 Practical tips for managing complexity and making decisions in ambiguous environments
TIMESTAMPS:
00:00 Introduction to Alphas Podcast
00:54 Meet Ivan Kusalic, CTO of NPAL
02:00 Ivan's Journey into Engineering and Leadership
07:05 The Role of NPAL in the Renewable Energy Sector
14:54 Navigating Ambiguity in Complex Systems
16:30 The Importance of Intuition in Leadership
23:24 Tools and Techniques for Managing Thoughts and Productivity
26:01 The Future of AI in Engineering
29:07 Experimenting with AI in Coding
29:57 Productivity Gains with AI Tools
30:40 Challenges with AI in Complex Projects
31:37 AI's Randomness and Managing It
32:24 Real-World Examples of AI Limitations
35:08 Setting Up AWS Infrastructure with AI
38:10 The Evolution of Tech Stacks
44:35 Adopting AI in Large Organizations
51:01 Reflections and Advice for Engineers
54:28 Conclusion and Contact Information
QUOTE:
"Intuition is an impulse to explore. It triggers the right thoughts for exploration in a moment that you would otherwise miss." - Ivan Kusalic, CTO of Enpal

Mar 20, 2025 • 1h 3min
#118 - Radical Engineering Culture and High Bar Hiring feat. Stefan Richter // Founder & CTO @ freiheit.com technologies
In this episode, Stefan Richter, Founder and CTO of freiheit.com technologies, discusses his journey in building high-performance engineering organizations. He emphasizes the importance of a radical engineering culture and maintaining a high bar for recruitment by focusing on 'tested in life' candidates. Stefan reveals how successful project delivery relies on simplicity, disciplined processes, and full stack engineers. He also shares insights on reducing friction in workflow and creating a collaborative environment that drives innovation and continuous feedback.

Feb 7, 2025 • 1h 9min
#117 - Navigating AI Trends with Dat Tran // Partner & CTO @ DATANOMIQ, VP AI/ML @ Beams Safety AI
Tobi and Dat discuss AI's impact on technical leadership, tools, deep learning, and Europe's innovation scene, including practical use cases for AI agents.
AI is moving faster than ever, and staying ahead of the curve is a challenge for every tech leader. In this episode, Dat Tran joins Tobi to break down what’s happening in the AI space, from cutting-edge model releases to AI-powered productivity tools and the global race for AI dominance. Dat has spent years leading AI teams at Idealo and Axel Springer, co-founding AI-driven startups, and now helps companies make sense of AI without the fluff.
Together, they explore the latest AI trends, the reality behind AI agents, and how engineering teams can actually get more done with AI today.
🚀 Dat’s journey in AI and tech leadership – From hacking on machine learning before it was cool to leading AI at Axel Springer and co-founding AI startups
🤖 DeepSeek R1’s impact – Why this new Chinese AI model is shaking up the industry and what makes it different from OpenAI’s GPT and Meta’s Llama
🛠️ AI agents & automation – What’s real and what’s just hype? Where do AI agents actually work in business today?
💻 The evolution of coding assistants – How AI tools like Cursor and GitHub Copilot are redefining what it means to be a full-stack engineer
🌍 The global AI race – Is Europe really falling behind? A look at China’s AI boom, US dominance, and what European AI companies need to do to compete
📈 CTO strategies for AI adoption – How to separate hype from real opportunities and where AI can have the biggest impact in engineering teams today
If you’re a CTO, AI enthusiast, or just trying to keep up with the latest AI breakthroughs, this episode is packed with insights you won’t want to miss.
00:00 Introduction to Alphalist Podcast
01:02 Meet Datran: From Berlin to AI Consulting
02:01 Datran's Journey in Tech and AI
03:42 The Evolution of AI and Machine Learning
04:25 Challenges and Successes in AI Startups
06:35 The Role of Open Source in AI Development
08:12 Building a Personal Brand in Tech
11:20 Recent Developments in AI
17:33 The Future of AI and Its Impact on Jobs
37:13 Long-Term Code Management Challenges
38:07 The Evolution of Programming Languages
39:34 Boosting Engineer Productivity with LLMs
43:42 The Rise of AI Agents
46:21 Evaluating AI Agents in Business
56:24 Global Perspectives on AI Development
01:01:33 Personal Reflections and Future Outlook
01:07:48 Outro and Final Thoughts

Jan 22, 2025 • 1h 3min
#116 - Exploring Platform Engineering feat. Camille Fournier // CTO @ Open Athena & Author @ O'Reilly Media
Platform Teams and DevOps Optimization: Insights from Camille Fournier on platform engineering, career growth, and CTO strategies for success.
How do you create an effective platform team and optimize DevOps? Tobi interviews Camille Fournier about her career, technical insights, and best practices in platform engineering. Camille shares her journey from building her own computers and installing Linux in high school to becoming Managing Director at JPMorgan Chase and authoring influential books for engineers 📚.
👩💻 Camille's early fascination with computers and engineering, including building her own systems and installing Linux
📚 Authoring 'The Manager's Path' and 'Platform Engineering'
🌐 Understanding platform engineering and its evolution from DevOps
🚀 Challenges and strategies in platform engineering for larger companies
💡 Key advice for CTOs on starting and managing successful platform teams
Listen here
00:00 Welcome to the Alphalist Podcast
01:09 Introducing Camille Fournier
02:04 Camille's Journey into Engineering
04:37 The Fascination with Platform Engineering
07:43 The Evolution of DevOps and Platform Teams
14:48 Defining Platform Engineering
18:54 Building Effective Platforms in Diverse Organizations
30:35 The Importance of Trust in Platform Teams
33:33 The Role of Product Managers in Platform Products
34:12 Customer Focused Mindset in Platform Engineering
35:02 Measuring Success and Metrics in Platform Teams
35:53 Communicating Platform Success to Leadership
40:22 The Importance of Recognizing Engineering Work
44:31 Avoiding Overengineering in Platform Teams
48:19 Leadership Challenges in Platform Engineering
55:22 Advice for Aspiring Platform Engineers
59:42 Final Thoughts and Reflections

Jan 9, 2025 • 1h 2min
115 - Exploring Growth and Compliance feat. Dennis Winter // CTO @ Börse Stuttgart
Dennis Winter, CTO of Börse Stuttgart, shares insights from his extensive fintech experience, previously serving as CTO of SolarisBank. He discusses scaling tech in regulated industries, emphasizing security, compliance, and culture. Dennis highlights the importance of building resilient infrastructure early, managing technical debt, and fostering team ownership. He explores the evolution of team structures as companies grow, the challenges of implementing BYOD policies in banking, and navigating compliance complexities with a focus on collaboration and automation.

Dec 19, 2024 • 41min
#114 - Building an SDK feat. Dr. Daniel Hauschildt // CPTO @ IMG.LY
Dr. Daniel Hauschildt, Co-founder and CPTO of IMG.LY, shares his expertise in building photo and video editing SDKs. He delves into the essentials of developer-friendly documentation, emphasizing its role in marketing. Daniel discusses the challenges of cross-platform compatibility, advocating for the beauty of well-designed APIs. He also highlights their focus on algorithm optimization over raw computational power. With insights on modular design, he paints a vivid picture of navigating the technical hurdles in the SDK landscape.

Dec 5, 2024 • 50min
#113 - Faster Incident Response feat. Tim Armandpour // CTO @ PagerDuty
Planning AND Practice: The Secret to Incident Response
Plan and PRACTICE for better incident response with insights from Tim Armandpour, CTO of PagerDuty. Learn the secrets to resilience from the team that mitigated the impact of a major outage—handling a 250% traffic surge while delivering on their SLA.
Listen to find out:
🛠️ Why planning AND practice are both critical for incident response.
🚧 How to practice for incident response (e.g Failure Fridays with Chaos Engineering)
🧑🤝🧑 Ownership: Why tech AND business teams must join post-mortems.
☁️ How to mitigate the impact of your cloud provider’s lower SLA.
⚓ Which architectural patterns are more resilient?
⚖️ WARNING: “bend” the CAP theorem at your own risk
Listen here
TimeStamps:
(00:00:00) Introduction to Alphalist Podcast
(00:01:00) Meet Tim Armanpour
(00:01:56) Tim's Early Career
(00:06:22) Handling Major Incidents at PagerDuty
(00:09:21) The Importance of Preparedness
(00:13:54) Practicing Failure Scenarios
(00:18:16) Resilient Infrastructure and Architectural Patterns
(00:22:44) Standardization and Data Management
(00:25:48) Exploring Infrastructure Resilience
(00:26:20) Achieving High Availability with Lower SLA Cloud Platforms
(00:29:38) Defining Meaningful SLIs
(00:32:15) Assessing Incident Readiness
(00:35:15) The Importance of Ownership
(00:41:30) Continuous Improvement
(00:43:53) Lessons from a Yogurt Business
(00:48:18) Final Thoughts and Takeaways

Nov 21, 2024 • 49min
#112 - Cross Functional Team Members feat. Daniel Bartholomae // CTO @ optilyz
In this engaging discussion, Daniel Bartholomae, CTO at Optilyz, shares insights from his journey in tech and leadership. He reveals how cross-functional team dynamics can enhance efficiency without traditional roles, replacing product managers to accelerate sprints. Daniel discusses the effectiveness of tools like Miro and Asana over Jira and emphasizes the importance of hiring team members with diverse skills. He also introduces Architectural Decision Records (ADRs) as a key method for documenting technical choices, promoting clear communication and collaboration.

Nov 7, 2024 • 56min
#111 - Organising for Impact feat. Eric Bowman // CTO @ King
Eric Bowman, CTO at King, brings a wealth of experience from gaming and e-commerce. He delves into the importance of balancing outputs and outcomes for impactful results. The conversation touches on organizing teams effectively to boost productivity and minimize bottlenecks. Eric also discusses the concept of adjacent possibilities in innovation, especially concerning AI. He emphasizes the need for clear problem definitions and strategic goal-setting to foster a culture of continuous improvement. Tune in for practical insights for technical leaders!
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