Nelson Spencer Portfolio

Nelson Spencer - AI-native software engineer

I build AI-native products, thoughtful interfaces, and internal tools that help teams work better.

Focus Areas

AI-NATIVE PRODUCT ENGINEERING FOR NEW PRODUCTS, AGENTIC TOOLS, AND SOFTWARE WHERE AI IS THE EXPERIENCE.
DESIGN ENGINEERING FOR AMBIGUOUS FLOWS: PROTOTYPES, INTERFACES, AND POLISH THAT MAKE NEW BEHAVIOR FEEL USABLE.
AI ENABLEMENT, AUTOMATION, AND GTM ENGINEERING FOR INTERNAL TEAMS WHERE THE PROBLEM IS THE POINT.

Work

Recruiting Operations Platform

Client Project

AI enablement for a GTM-facing recruiting workflow, turning manual role sourcing and publishing into a daily operating system.

Outcome: 20+ hrs/week reclaimed

Problem

A team was manually collecting, deduplicating, reviewing, and publishing jobs across a fragmented weekly workflow.

Built

Designed the review experience and built the ingestion, deduplication, publishing, performance tracking, and newsletter workflows behind it.

Result

Publishing moved from weekly to daily, the team reclaimed 20+ hours per week, and the workflow became a single operational system.

Architecture

TypeScript full-stack platform on Node.js with Convex, Upstash Redis, Trigger.dev background jobs, Firecrawl/OpenRouter ingestion, and Vercel deployment.

Live site

Community Hiring Platform

Client Project

Product engineering for a Slack-native hiring workflow, moving role management, applicant tracking, and follow-up out of threads into a shared tracking system.

Outcome: ~300 monthly active users

Problem

A community was managing hiring through Slack threads, which made applicant tracking, follow-up, and accountability hard to maintain.

Built

Built the product surface and workflow layer: role management, applicant tracking, Slack-native posting, member authentication, and automated notifications.

Result

The platform supports roughly 300 monthly active users and gives the community a structured system of record around hiring activity.

Architecture

Next.js hiring platform with Supabase PostgreSQL, Drizzle ORM, Slack API integrations, and Clerk authentication.

Website Feedback Intake Tool

Internal Tool

Design engineering for an internal product workflow: screenshot capture, annotation, and Linear routing in one lightweight tool.

Outcome: $100+/mo in tooling replaced

Problem

As I was building products for clients, I needed an easy and efficient way for them to provide feedback. The existing tools felt heavier than the problem, so I wanted to see if I could build a simpler version myself.

Built

Designed and built a Chrome extension that captures screenshots, supports annotations and redactions, collects bug and enhancement requests, and routes feedback directly into Linear.

Result

Replaced the third-party tool in my workflow and kept client feedback flowing directly into the development process.

Architecture

Chrome MV3 extension with a Convex backend, screenshot storage, domain-based Linear routing, and email notifications.

Chrome Store

Metro-North MCP Server

Open Source Project

AI-native product engineering for agents: an open-source MCP server that gives personal AI tools real Metro-North transit context.

Outcome: Public on npm · v2.1.0

Problem

I wanted my personal AI agent (Hermes) to understand my Metro-North commute using real schedule, station, alert, and departure data.

Built

Designed typed tool contracts and built an MCP server using public Metro-North feeds for schedules, service alerts, realtime departures, station lookup, and trip planning.

Result

The project is now a public npm package with tests, CI, documentation, and support for MCP-compatible clients.

Architecture

TypeScript MCP server on Node.js with SQLite + Redis caching, Dockerized, powered by MTA GTFS and real-time feeds.

GitHub npm Release v2.1.0

WhatsApp Reporting Prototype

Consulting Project

Design engineering prototype for field operations, turning unstructured WhatsApp partner communication into structured workflows.

Outcome: Structured capture in-channel

Problem

A social enterprise coordinated field partner updates and support through WhatsApp, but important operational data was trapped in unstructured chats.

Built

Turned stakeholder research and workflow mapping into WhatsApp Flows that captured structured reports and support requests inside the channel partners already used.

Result

The prototype showed how unstructured partner communication could become structured operational data without forcing a new tool into the workflow.

Architecture

WhatsApp Flows prototype for structured reporting, partner support workflows, and operational data collection, informed by human-centered research.

AI Enablement Training

Workshop

AI enablement training that helped an operations team build fluency and design practical AI-powered workflows.

Outcome: Working automation in 3 days

Problem

A small ops team wanted to build AI fluency and practical automations to multiply their capacity.

Built

Designed and led a three-day workshop where participants mapped their own use cases, then built a customer-support workflow that triaged emails and routed work into Asana.

Result

The team left with a working automation, a reusable workflow pattern, and more confidence applying AI to day-to-day operations.

References

When we first started The Plus Side Job Board, the entire process was manual. Every week we spent hours combing through different job boards, selecting roles, and copying and pasting them into our system. It was tedious and time-consuming. Meeting Nelson was a significant turning point. He quickly understood our workflow and built an automated solution that streamlined the entire process. What stood out most was how easy he was to work with: he took a complex situation and simply handled it. There was very little back-and-forth, the rollout was seamless, and the system was up and running faster than we expected. And the icing on the cake: it looks fantastic. The final product is not only efficient, but beautifully designed and easy to use. I would highly recommend Nelson to any organization or business trying to figure out how AI or automation can improve their processes, systems, or operational workflows.

The Plus Side Team - Context: Recruiting Operations Platform

The way everything was broken down made it very easy to follow and navigate the terms. Nelson helped me change my way of thinking about the different ways to leverage automation tools and AI to work more efficiently. I really enjoyed working through things while being guided. It made me even more eager to do it independently.

Alvin Belt - VP of Operations - AC Brands - Context: AI Enablement Workshop

I went from knowing very little about how AI tools could be leveraged in my day to day to actively thinking about different automations that could be used to save us time as a part of a small team with big goals.

Nicole Iturbe - Senior Director of Consumer Strategy and Operations - AC Brands - Context: AI Enablement Workshop