My CTO operating plan & templates.

I ask what work must never stop, where users lose time, and what a successful quarter looks like. I map critical services to a business owner and technical owner and list the top dependencies.

I reconcile headcount/capacity, support coverage, budget, supplier renewals, asset ownership, and admin access. I note uncertainty explicitly rather than turning assumptions into a dashboard.

I pick one critical service and run a controlled restore or recovery exercise. I compare elapsed time and recovered data against the agreed recovery-time and recovery-point objectives. I record the gaps and a funded owner.

I build a risk register with likelihood, business impact, current controls, treatment, owner, due date, and residual risk. I take the acceptance decisions to the person authorised to accept them.

I agree support hours, a usable priority matrix, escalation ownership, and baseline service metrics. I use the SLA builder as a starting proposal and confirm staffing before making promises.

I score current initiatives by outcome, risk reduction, effort, dependency, and available owner. I explicitly stop, defer, or fund work rather than expecting every team to absorb another priority.

I choose one reliability improvement and one user-facing improvement. Each gets a starting measure, target, accountable owner, rollback plan, and evidence of the result.

I establish weekly operational reviews, a monthly service/risk review, and a quarterly roadmap decision. The board update explains outcomes, risks, money, and requested decisions in plain language.