Gregory Heerkens
Summary
With 8+ years of experience as a Founding Developer, I bridge the gap between deep-tech architecture and success narrative. Expert in translating complex systems into plainspoken strategy. Uniquely qualified to shape editorial voice by combining a Master's in Communications with a proven career in full-stack engineering. Proven ability to architect systems that scale from 0→1, and turning raw data into compelling customer stories.
Core Competencies
Narrative Strategy and Writing: Technical case studies, crisis communication, product documentation, creative and persuasive copy
Applied AI/LLM: LLM APIs, AI-assisted product design, Prompt Engineering, Model Orchestration, DOCTIO Protocol, Semantic Clustering, MCP
Research and Analysis: Quantitative and qualitative research, data analysis, sentiment analytics, hypothesis testing, A/B testing, experimental design, survey design.
Product & Leadership: Cross-functional team dynamics, Product delivery & stakeholder alignment, Agile process, System design & modernization, Creative problem-solving & adaptive thinking, Documentation/onboarding
Professional Experience
GetTattle, Inc. | Founding Developer
Nov 2017 – Oct 2025
- •Technical Content Architecture: Architected Snapshots, an experience-driven reporting engine that generated executive summaries from raw SQL/NoSQL data.
- •Strategic Narrative & Product Positioning: Defined the "Actionable Intelligence" narrative for the flagship AI Coach product. Translated complex points of sentiment analysis and causal inference into clear, human-readable recommendations for non-technical stakeholders, directly driving adoption across 250+ global brands.
- •Change Management Communication: Played an instrumental role in high-stakes migration from Legacy PHP to a .NET monorepo. Authored the knowledge base and technical documentation that served as the single source of truth, reducing developer friction and maintaining operational continuity during team restructuring.
- •LLM Workflow Design (Agentic AI): Pioneered the integration of LLMs for "AI Automatch," creating the prompt engineering frameworks that has allowed the AI to process ~1B points of Merchant menu items in processing backlogs.
Harris RF Communications | Multimedia Simulation Engineer
Aug 2010 – Nov 2017
- •Technical Translation: Served as the primary liaison between military subject matter experts (SMEs) and engineering teams. Translated military specifications (MilSpec) into user-centric training narratives and high-fidelity simulation scenarios.
- •Instructional Design: Worked independently and embedded within the technical writing team to develop dozens of learning modules according to rigorous instructional design standards.
- •Leadership: Led the team as project manager and ad-hoc program manager during leadership transition, delivering in-depth project and product management reporting in addition to core duties
Strategic Research and Thought Leadership
MASTER OF SCIENCE THESIS: Narrative Theory in Crisis Contexts
Thesis: "Justice by Any Means: Societal Stress and the Rise of Vigilantism"
- •Focus: Conducted a quantitative analysis of 360+ data points correlating "Societal Stressors" (Doomsday Clock, Crime Statistics) with the popularity of "Anti-Hero/Vigilante" archetypes in media.
- •Method: This research formed a predictive framework for how public trust erodes in "ineffective systems," leading to a demand for "direct action" solutions.
- •Outcome: Methodology utilized rigorous coding reliability (96.8%) to map sentiment trends, demonstrating the ability to turn abstract cultural anxiety into measurable data, forming a cohesive and predictive thesis.
DOCTIO: A Protocol for AI-Assisted Software Development
- •Concept: Architected a novel six-stage, task-level micro-workflow protocol defining deterministic development with AI agents (Domain, Objects, Ethos, Tests, Implementation, Optimization).
- •Theory: LLMs require deterministic narrative boundaries to prevent hallucination. In the creation of these documents, not only is the end product fully documented, but the inherent stochasticity of the agent is minimized
- •Outcome: Used to generate new MVPs rapidly, enforcing clean architecture (SOLID constraints, dependency boundaries) across all projects.
LINEWRIGHT: An LLM Writing Assistant
An AI-powered writing assistant with voice retention and uncanny prediction, providing inline AI writing assistance through 'ghost text'.
REKO: The Book Genome Engine
A high-quality book recommendation site based on a 50-point "DNA profile," conceptualized as "the Pandora of books".
Education
Rochester Institute of Technology | M.S. Communications & Media Technology (GPA 3.9)
Rochester Institute of Technology | B.S. Information Technology & New Media (GPA 3.4)