Status: keeping the human in the loop

I'm Ted Sanders — a support ops specialist turned product-minded operator.

I believe AI is most powerful when it gives people back the time, energy, and patience to be genuinely kind to each other. The tools should serve the team. Always.

01. Transferable_Skills_Matrix

// seven disciplines, one operator

Discipline

Empathy

Strategy

Technical

Velocity

Data

Core_Focus

Support

The feedback loop. Turning user pain into product signal — with patience.

Empathy

Strategy

Technical

Velocity

Data

Root-cause + tone

Leadership

Mentorship over management. High trust, low friction, real conversations.

Empathy

Strategy

Technical

Velocity

Data

Coaching & 1:1s

Scrum Master

Remove blockers before the team feels them. Protect focus like it's sacred.

Empathy

Strategy

Technical

Velocity

Data

Flow & ceremonies (PSM I)

Project Mgmt

Predictable delivery without burning the people doing the work.

Empathy

Strategy

Technical

Velocity

Data

Cross-team coordination

Product

Close the gap between 'it works' and 'it actually helps a person'.

Empathy

Strategy

Technical

Velocity

Data

Discovery → roadmap

Data Analysis

Numbers as evidence, not weapons. Honest dashboards, useful questions.

Empathy

Strategy

Technical

Velocity

Data

Support metrics, member trends

AI Literacy

AI as a teammate, not a replacement. Built and tuned support AI in production.

Empathy

Strategy

Technical

Velocity

Data

Chatbots, workflow automation

Support. The feedback loop. Turning user pain into product signal — with patience.

Leadership. Mentorship over management. High trust, low friction, real conversations.

Scrum Master. Remove blockers before the team feels them. Protect focus like it's sacred.

Project Mgmt. Predictable delivery without burning the people doing the work.

Product. Close the gap between 'it works' and 'it actually helps a person'.

Data Analysis. Numbers as evidence, not weapons. Honest dashboards, useful questions.

AI Literacy. AI as a teammate, not a replacement. Built and tuned support AI in production.

02. Work_History.log

// most recent first

2026 — Present · Flodesk

Member Experience Manager

LeadershipSupportOps

→Lead a team of Member Experience Specialists delivering genuinely warm SaaS support.
→Scale support ops in a fast-paced startup — process, tooling, and tone of voice.
→Treat performance metrics as a compass for coaching, not a stick for compliance.

2020 — 2026 · Flodesk

Member Experience Senior Specialist

SupportDocsProduct

→Resolved technical issues and coached members on email-marketing best practices.
→Authored original Help Center documentation; refactored older articles for clarity.
→Acted as a translation layer between member pain and the product roadmap.

2019 — 2020 · ProTrainings

Customer Support — Tech Specialist

SupportAIScrum-adjacent

→Tuned an AI chatbot to deflect mundane tickets so humans could handle the human moments.
→Paired with engineering to refine user stories and surface UX papercuts.
→Owned chargeback disputes end-to-end across PayPal and the card processor.

2017 — 2019 · HeatLink Group

Customer Service / Inside Sales

PMCoordination

→Coordinated across engineering, marketing, and customers to ship projects to spec.
→Built production trackers that turned guesswork into a status anyone could read.
→Bridged engineer designs and end-user input on custom system configurations.

2015 — 2017 · Loss Prevention Services

Team Leader

LeadershipPM

→Led two account-management teams of up to 15 direct reports.
→Rewrote training docs and coached members through error patterns to prevent repeats.
→Daily status reporting and monthly audits to keep SLAs ahead of expectations.

Earlier · Schulers · Convergys · Meijer · Digital Science Group

Foundations: receiving, helpdesk, retail, scanning ops

Origins

→Trained staff on new applications and equipment as a Scan Technician.
→Inbound helpdesk at high volume — learned to resolve in one call, not three.

03. AI_Literacy.exe

I was tuning support AI before it became a LinkedIn bullet point — and I still believe the person on the other end matters most.

At ProTrainings I owned the AI chatbot — improving it to deflect mundane tickets so my teammates could spend their attention on the moments that really needed a human. At Flodesk I use modern LLMs to draft documentation, triage edge cases, and turn raw member feedback into product-ready signal.

Translation: I treat AI as a force multiplier for people, not a replacement for them. The job is still to understand the human on the other end — the AI just buys us the space to do it well.

04. Certifications.json

// receipts

✓Professional Scrum Master™ I (PSM I)

✓Product Management: Building a Product Roadmap

✓Project Management Foundations: Requirements

✓Transitioning to Product Management

Education: Central Michigan University (Chemistry) · Pitt Community College (Entrepreneurial & Small Business Operations).

$ ./say_hello --to=ted

Got a team that needs a warm translation layer between humans, tickets, and roadmaps?