Engineering Leadership Hiring Patterns: From $50M ARR to IPO in SaaS

ICONIQ analyzes engineering executive hiring trends at SaaS companies in the $50M ARR to IPO stage, revealing that internal promotion becomes 2.5x more common than at earlier stages and that only half of externally hired engineering leaders have prior Head of Engineering experience. The report also shows sector-specific hiring preferences, with Infrastructure companies favoring candidates with infrastructure backgrounds due to product complexity, while Application companies are more flexible on sector backgrounds.