Jason Lowenthal-Hershey

Staff Software Engineer · Codefi · Springfield, MO

Building software that actually ships,
and lifting up the people who build it.

I'm Jason — an architect, mentor, and lifelong builder. I lead the engineering behind Traction Studio AI, write about the craft and the cost of doing it well, and spend my off-hours making things by hand.

Get in touch See my experience
Portrait of Jason Lowenthal-Hershey
01

About

A multi-faceted technologist who chooses tools to fit the job, not the other way around.

I've spent the better part of two decades building production software — from hierarchical pricing services and supply-chain platforms to research-grade assessments and, most recently, an AI-powered startup accelerator. My current focus is technical leadership and architecture inside large organizations: taking ambiguous problems, breaking them into shippable pieces, and helping teams move faster than they thought they could.

I work in whatever stack the problem calls for. I came up in the Java world, spent years in REST API design, ran through plenty of front-end and infra, and these days I'm shipping AI-native systems at Codefi. The constant across all of it isn't a language or a framework — it's a belief that good software comes from people who feel safe enough to be honest with each other.

"A rising tide raises all boats — and it's important to me that the people I work with are excited to grow, contribute, and collaborate every day."

Outside the codebase: I write about the craft (and about mental health for developers, which I've been open about since 2016), I draw and paint when I can, I'm raising three daughters who keep me grounded, and I mentor wherever I can be useful.

02

Experience

A path through enterprise systems, edu-tech, advanced manufacturing, and now AI.

  1. Current · Springfield, MO

    Staff Software Engineer · Codefi

    Technical lead behind Traction Studio AI — Codefi's AI-powered startup accelerator that turns founder ideas into validated, fundable ventures. I own the architecture, set the engineering bar, and bring a diverse stack history to a local organization where the work actually moves the needle.

  2. Prior

    Lead Software Engineer · World Wide Technology

    Tech lead and senior engineer across enterprise commercial, public-sector, and telecom service-provider systems at one of the largest privately-held technology integrators in the country. Architected and led teams on supply-chain and integration platforms.

  3. Prior

    Principal Software Architect · True Velocity

    Led architecture for advanced manufacturing software at True Velocity Ammunition. Bridged the gap between manufacturing-floor reality and modern software practice — measurement, traceability, and integration.

  4. Prior

    Advanced Software Engineer · Skyfactor (Macmillan Learning)

    Built research-grade program assessment and benchmarking products used by higher-ed institutions. Helped translate decades of education research into software educators could actually use.

  5. Earlier

    Software Engineer · Asynchrony Labs & earlier roles

    Pair programming, XP practices, and team sticker art (yes, really — see the "Team Sorting Hat" piece in the art section). The years that taught me how a healthy engineering culture actually feels.

03

Selected Work

A handful of the things I've shipped or helped build.

Now · Codefi

Traction Studio AI

AI-powered platform for founders, accelerators & venture funds

Codefi's platform for the complete traction journey — three layers (intelligence, tools, expert services) and three stages (ideation → incubation → acceleration) that take a founder from "is there a problem worth solving?" all the way to traction. I'm the Staff Software Engineer behind it: I own the architecture, set the engineering bar, and lead the team building it.

  • Architecture
  • Engineering leadership
  • Team building
  • Founder outcomes

Read the project page →  ·  Open the app →

Side project · Featured

A.R.I.A. — Discord bot for [THE FACILITY]

Built & maintained for science communicator Kyle Hill's community · 2021–present

A Python Discord bot I've quietly shipped on for nearly five years (288 commits, ~13.3k lines, 88 modules) for [THE FACILITY], the Discord community around Kyle Hill's science-communication work. Hybrid slash + prefix commands, MongoDB-backed XP and profiles, an interactive muffin generator with buttons and dropdowns, NASA APOD & Wolfram Alpha integrations, a containment minigame, and a Heroku CD pipeline across three long-lived environments. It's the side-project answer to "are you the same engineer when no one is paying you?"

  • Python 3.10+
  • discord.py
  • MongoDB
  • Pillow
  • NASA & Wolfram APIs
  • Heroku CD
  • pytest async

Read the project page →

Past

Hierarchical Pricing Service

Earlier role

A RESTful pricing-management service over a Store / District / Region / Division / Corporate hierarchy. JAXB and XStream for the wire formats, Gradle & Tomcat for delivery, JUnit for the safety net.

  • Java
  • REST
  • JAXB
  • JUnit
Speaking

Debugging My Depression

AIC 2018

A vulnerable, public talk about clinical depression in the software industry — what the symptoms actually look like, the strategies that have worked for me, and why our profession gets hit hard. Delivered live; recording on YouTube.

Watch the talk →

Volunteer

Lunch Buddy Mentor

Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Ozarks

Weekly one-on-one lunches with an elementary-school student over two years. Small, consistent presence — the kind of mentorship that doesn't feel like much in any one week but compounds.

04

Writing

A decade of essays on programming, careers, and the unsexy human parts of engineering.

On Medium

All posts on Medium →

For Simple Programmer byline note

I wrote a run of guest pieces for Simple Programmer between 2015 and 2017. The site has since rewritten the bylines on those posts, but the work and the words below are mine — and I'm proud of them.

05

Speaking

When the topic matters more than the comfort of staying silent.

Debugging my Depression

AIC 2018

A talk I gave about living with clinical depression as a working software engineer. What it actually feels like day to day, the symptoms that hide in plain sight, the strategies that have helped me, and why I keep talking about it even when it's uncomfortable: because somebody in the room is going through it and might not say so.

If this talk lands for you, or for someone on your team — please reach out. I'm always glad to talk, and I'm available to give a version of this for engineering teams.

Open on YouTube →

06

Art & Side Craft

I'm a hobbyist working in varied media — digital, traditional, sticker design. The other half of my brain.

Team Sorting Hat

Asynchrony Labs · Sticker design

Team identity art for an XP-style engineering shop.

Pear Programming

Digital · Tech humor

A visual pun a pair programmer can love.

White Tailed Deer Drinking Water

Digital · Wildlife

Quiet observation, painted in GIMP.

Tribute to a Hero

Digital · Portrait

One of the personal pieces.

My Grandpa Vic

Digital · Family portrait

Drawing the people who made me.

Self Portrait

Digital · Self-study

The hardest subject I've drawn.

See the full gallery on DeviantArt →

07

Education & Honors

Drury University

Bachelor of Arts · 2002–2007 · Springfield, MO

Attended on a Presidential Scholarship and a Performance Grant. Coursework spanned algorithms, compiler theory, database design, operating systems, programming languages, systems analysis & design, plus corporate policy & ethics and strategic management.

  • Chair Award — outstanding achievement in Computer Science
  • Outstanding Graduate — Computer Information Systems (May 2007)
  • Outstanding Graduate — Computer Science (May 2007)
  • Math & Computer Science Club; Orchestra; Allies

Languages & Off-Hours

  • Spanish — elementary proficiency
  • Volunteer mentor — Big Brothers Big Sisters of the Ozarks (2011–2013)
  • Reader: fantasy & science fiction
  • Maker: digital painting, illustration, the occasional guitar
08

Let's talk

Hiring, speaking, mentoring, or just want to compare notes — my inbox is open.

jason.m.lowenthal@gmail.com