Terms and privacy.
How coaching and advisory engagements work, and what happens to the information you send me. Written to be read, not to be survived.
Last updated August 2026
The short version: I do this work personally and not on behalf of any employer. You pay before we start, you can move or cancel a session with a day's notice, and I will not promise you a job. I use your email to reply to you and for nothing else.
1. Who you are dealing with
This site and the coaching and advisory services on it are offered by TJ Saenz as an individual, based in Texas, United States. I have a day job in product, and none of this work is done for, endorsed by, or connected to my employer. Nothing I say in a session represents my employer's views, and I will not discuss my employer's confidential information with you.
When these terms say "I" or "me" they mean TJ Saenz. "You" means the person booking or using the services, or reading this site.
2. What I offer
Two kinds of work, described on the coaching and advisory pages:
- Career coaching. Resume and LinkedIn reviews, mock interviews, and coaching sessions for product managers. Some of it is asynchronous written feedback, some of it is live conversation.
- Product advisory. Product and AI strategy, discovery, and advisory work for teams.
Before anything starts we agree in writing, usually over email, on what you are getting, what it costs, and roughly when. That written exchange plus this page is the whole agreement. If the two ever conflict, what we agreed in email wins.
Advisory work for a company is usually scoped in a separate statement of work. Where one exists, it takes precedence over these terms for that engagement.
3. Booking and scheduling
Submitting the form on this site is not a booking. It tells me what you are interested in and starts a conversation. An engagement begins when we have agreed on scope and price and you have paid, unless we agreed otherwise in writing.
Live sessions are scheduled by email at a time that works for both of us. Sessions run for the length quoted, typically 60 minutes. If you arrive late, the session still ends at the scheduled time.
Asynchronous work, like a resume review, has a turnaround quoted when you book. The clock starts when you have sent me everything I need.
4. Fees and payment
Current rates are quoted in the email you get after submitting the form, and in any statement of work. Rates can change, but a rate quoted to you holds for that engagement.
Unless we agree otherwise:
- One-off sessions and reviews are paid in full before the work starts.
- Session packs are paid in full up front and used within three months.
- Ongoing monthly coaching is billed monthly in advance and either of us can stop it with two weeks' notice before the next billing date.
- Advisory work is invoiced as set out in the statement of work, payable within 14 days.
Prices are in US dollars. You are responsible for any taxes that apply where you are, and for any fees your bank or payment provider charges.
5. Rescheduling and cancellations
Things come up. Here is how I handle it.
If you need to move a session
Tell me at least 24 hours before the start time and we will find another slot at no cost. Inside 24 hours, or if you do not show up, that session counts as used. If something genuinely unavoidable happens, tell me and I will almost certainly be reasonable about it.
If I need to move a session
I will give you as much notice as I can and reschedule at a time that suits you. If a replacement time does not work for you, you get that session refunded in full.
Ending an engagement
You can stop working with me at any time. Tell me by email. Unused, unstarted sessions are refunded as described below. Either of us can end an engagement immediately if the other behaves abusively or unlawfully.
6. Refunds
- Sessions you have not used and I have not scheduled are refunded in full.
- Sessions already delivered, and asynchronous work already started, are not refunded.
- If I cancel and cannot offer you a workable replacement, you are refunded in full.
- If you are genuinely unhappy with a session, tell me within seven days. I would rather fix it or refund it than have you carry it around.
Refunds go back the way the payment came, usually within ten business days.
7. What this is not
Coaching is advice and practice. It is not a placement service and it is not a guarantee. I cannot promise you an interview, an offer, a promotion, a raise, a visa, or any other outcome, and nothing on this site or in a session should be read as promising one. What you get out of this depends mostly on what you do with it.
I am not a lawyer, an accountant, a financial adviser, a therapist, or an immigration adviser, and nothing I say is legal, tax, financial, medical, or immigration advice. If a decision needs one of those, go get one.
Advisory work is recommendation and analysis. Decisions about your product, your team, and your business stay yours.
8. Confidentiality
What you tell me in a session stays between us. I will not share your name, your employer, your resume, your compensation, your interview performance, or anything else you tell me, and I will not use your situation as an example anywhere without asking you first and getting a yes.
The same runs the other way for advisory work: I will treat your company's non-public information as confidential and will sign your NDA if you have one.
Two narrow exceptions. I may have to disclose something if the law requires it, and I may act without your permission if I believe someone is at risk of serious harm.
Testimonials only ever go up with your explicit written approval of the exact wording and how you are credited.
9. Who owns what
Your resume, your documents, your product plans, and everything else you bring stay yours. Written feedback I produce for you is yours to use however you like.
Frameworks, templates, exercises, and materials I bring to the work stay mine. You are welcome to use them for yourself or inside your own team. Please do not resell them, publish them, or run them as your own paid programme.
The writing, design, images, and code on this site are mine. You can quote a reasonable amount with credit and a link. Do not republish whole posts.
10. Your information
I run this site myself and I do not want your data any more than I need it.
What I collect
- What you type into the contact form. Your name, your email address, the services you ticked, your company if you enter one, and whatever you write in the message box.
- Anything you send me afterwards. Emails, resumes, documents, and notes I take during a session.
- Basic, aggregated site analytics. Which pages get visited and which links get clicked. This is not tied to a name, and I do not use advertising or cross-site tracking cookies.
What I do with it
I use it to reply to you, to do the work you have hired me for, and to keep the records I need for tax and accounting. That is the whole list. I do not sell it, rent it, trade it, or hand it to anyone for marketing, and I do not add you to a mailing list because you filled in a form.
Who else touches it
A few services I use to run this, each of which only sees what it needs:
- Vercel hosts the site and provides the privacy-friendly, cookie-free analytics.
- Resend delivers the form submission to my inbox and sends you the reply.
- My email and calendar provider holds our correspondence and any scheduled sessions.
- A payment processor handles payment when there is one. Card details go to them, never to me, and I never see or store your full card number.
How long I keep it
Enquiries that go nowhere get deleted within about a year. Records tied to paid work stick around as long as tax and accounting rules require, which in the US is generally seven years. Session notes get deleted when the engagement ends unless you ask me to keep them.
What you can ask for
Email me and ask for a copy of what I hold on you, a correction, or deletion, and I will sort it out within 30 days. Deletion requests are honoured except where I am legally required to keep a record. Depending on where you live you may have further rights under laws such as the GDPR or the Texas Data Privacy and Security Act. Ask and I will apply them.
Security, honestly stated
I take reasonable care: reputable providers, access limited to me, and no storage of payment details. No system is perfectly secure, so please do not send me government identification numbers, passwords, or anything else you would not want sitting in an inbox.
11. This website
The blog posts and pages here are opinion and experience, offered as-is. They are not advice for your specific situation, and product management being what it is, something true in one company is wrong in the next.
Links out to other sites are there because I found them useful. I do not control them and I am not responsible for what they do.
I try to keep the site up and correct, but I cannot promise it is always available, always current, or free of errors.
12. Limits of responsibility
To the fullest extent the law allows, I am not liable for indirect or consequential losses, including lost income, lost profits, lost opportunities, or a job you did not get. My total liability for any engagement is capped at what you actually paid me for it.
Nothing here limits liability for fraud, or for anything else that cannot lawfully be limited.
13. Changes to these terms
I will update this page when the way I work changes, and the date at the top will tell you when. The version in force for your engagement is the one published when you booked. If a change materially affects work already underway, I will tell you directly rather than expecting you to notice.
These terms are governed by the laws of the State of Texas, United States.
14. Getting in touch
Questions about any of this, or a request about your data, go to contact@tjsaenz.com. A real person reads it, and it is me.