I make hard things feel simple.

I coach product managers through the moves that are hardest to make alone. Product leader at Capital One.

TJ Saenz

My career started at age 10, in a small farming town in South Texas, fixing whatever the neighbors dropped off that wasn’t working. It is still the job: something’s confusing, someone’s stuck, and you get to hand it back working.

The answer looks different in maritime shipping than it does in consumer banking, and it has never once come from a better framework. It comes from asking why this is harder than it needs to be, and then talking to whoever is stuck.

01

Data is a compass, not a GPS

Data points you at the problem. Conversations tell you what it means. When the two disagree, dig in, because one of them is lying. After Shaun Clowes, on Lenny’s Podcast.

02

Averages are where insight goes to die

Every change helps some customers and stings others in ways the topline never shows. Both are hiding inside that tidy number.

03

Ship the smallest thing that can be wrong

My best calls were bets small enough that being wrong cost a week. The ones that hurt were the ones I made big, because they felt certain.

Now

Auto Servicing

Capital One

Chat, models that read what you actually need, and automation that takes the phone queue out of fixing a loan.

2025–26

Auto Refinance

Capital One

Real-time credit decisioning that cut refinancing from weeks to minutes.

2023–25

Sustainability Platform

CBRE

Zero to one: first pitch to enterprise contracts on three continents.

2022–23

Voyage Optimization

Nautilus Labs

Speed and routing models that burned less fuel across commercial fleets.

2021–22

Time Management

Paycom

Scheduling, timecards and compliance made faster and harder to get wrong.

2020–21

Insurance Marketplace

Sendero

Plain questions in place of a form, matched to coverage that actually fit.

2018–20

Epic EHR Implementation

Sendero

Tracked hardware readiness in real time so go-live held in every ward.

Working on your product career?

or just say hello

contact@tjsaenz.com

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