At QC Growth, we’re constantly testing and refining strategies that help early-stage founders accelerate customer insight and product-market fit—especially in deeply technical categories. One concept we’ve found particularly powerful is the Technical Advisory Board (TAB), a model made famous by Adam Frankl in The Developer-Facing Startup.

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TABs are more than just a sounding board—they’re a community of forward-thinking experts who help shape product direction, validate hypotheses, and keep your team plugged into real-world customer needs. When executed well, they’re also lightweight, async-friendly, and a meaningful way to create lasting relationships with future champions.

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A Real-World Example

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One of our portfolio companies is building an AI-powered tool designed to support complex engineering workflows. Their goal is to help developers eliminate toil, improve code quality, and scale engineering knowledge across fast-moving teams.

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To ensure they’re building something engineers truly want and need, they launched a Technical Advisory Board composed of senior engineering leaders in Developer Experience, Engineering Productivity, and System Reliability.

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This board is not a traditional, time-intensive group. It’s:

•Async-first – Most conversations happen in a shared Slack channel

•Low-lift – Minimal time commitment, focused on high-value feedback

•High-impact – The board directly influences product direction and roadmap priorities

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What Board Members Get

•Direct access to the founding team and other top engineering leaders

•Lifetime discounts or perks related to the product

•Opportunities to showcase their work via webinars, spotlights, or private forums

•A front-row seat to how AI is reshaping engineering workflows

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Live sessions are held monthly or bi-monthly, serving as optional spaces to review product updates, exchange ideas, and gather insights from peers.

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Why This Works

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Startups often struggle to get consistent, strategic feedback from the kinds of engineering leaders they want to serve. A well-run Technical Advisory Board flips that dynamic. Instead of chasing validation, you build an environment where insights flow freely.

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It’s also a win for the advisors. They get to shape the tools they wish existed, explore trends at the frontier of AI in engineering, and connect with peer leaders tackling similar challenges—without taking on a major time commitment.

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What You Risk Going Without

A founder’s gut instinct is critical. And a TAB is how you refine your thesis faster and earlier in your product development lifecycle when it’s easier to pivot. Otherwise you’re flying blind.

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Case in point: Privacy Dynamics. Geekwire recently posted a post-mortem story on why they shut down the business after failing to grow their SaaS ARR beyond $1M.

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“Graham Thompson, CEO and co-founder of Privacy Dynamics, said one of the biggest lessons learned was about identifying value. His advice for other founders: figure out what customers need and value most: ‘They’ll tell you, but you have to ask the right questions. I think if we did that, and we were really open to the response, we would have heard that the data is what was valuable.’”

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Thinking of Building Your Own TAB?

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We believe every developer-facing startup should consider launching a Technical Advisory Board, especially during the early phases of customer development and roadmap shaping.

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Keep it async. Keep it simple. Focus on quality of conversation, not quantity of meetings. We help our clients do just that—with templates, outreach strategies, and onboarding workflows that make it easy to get started.

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Interested in building your own TAB? Let’s talk. We’ll help you shape the structure, invite the right voices, and turn your product feedback loop into a strategic advantage.

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Written by the team at QC Growth. We partner with technical startups to build their Go-to-Market from 0 to 1, and beyond.

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