---
title: "About — Sam Couch"
description: "Software engineering, developer advocacy, production AI, and running a business. Sam Couch's background and direction toward investing and business decisions."
canonical: "https://samcouch.com/about/"
language: "en"
---

# About me.

I've spent my career **building software and helping people use it.** Now I want to bring that experience closer to the decisions about which businesses to buy and how to improve them.

## Engineering and developer advocacy

I'm Sam Couch, a Senior Developer Advocate at Jack Henry. Before that, I was a Developer Advocate at IBM. Across those roles, I've worked with developers, startups, and financial institutions, helping people understand technology and put it to work.

That work includes hands-on engineering. At Jack Henry, I **designed, built, and now operate AI-powered documentation search.** I also led and designed self-service API onboarding, and built a documentation checker that I maintain across more than 50 API services and roughly 1,000 endpoints.

Developer advocacy adds another part of the job: listening to what people need, explaining technical choices, and working with the people who have to use the result.

## Running a business

I built and run Gather Shot, a profitable event-photo collection business. I built it **end to end:** the software, the marketing site, and the business strategy. I handle **customer acquisition,** including SEO and visibility in AI-generated answers (AEO), along with pricing, customer support, and day-to-day operations.

There, **the software and the business are my responsibility.** A technical decision sits alongside questions about how customers find the product, what they'll pay for, and what it costs to keep it running.

[**Gather Shot**Event-photo collection](https://gathershot.com/)

## Working with investors

My consulting work has included **company and technology research for private equity investment decisions.** I've also helped review a software product's code and capabilities for a client's long-term contract evaluation.

That gives me a starting point for a broader role: bringing firsthand engineering knowledge to the questions people ask about a business. What does the product actually do? What would an improvement require? Which technical assumptions need to be tested?

## The work I want next

I want to bring my experience in software, AI, developer advocacy, and running a business into **investing, acquisitions, and improving companies.** I want to help decide which opportunities are worth pursuing, what a business needs, and where to put time and money.

That means getting to know the company, its customers, and the people building it. It means looking beyond what a product promises to understand how it works, what customers value, and what it would take to change it. My technical background gives me a way into those questions, and developer advocacy has taught me to work through them with people who bring different experience.

**I want to help choose the priorities and take responsibility for the work that follows.** Sometimes that will mean building software or testing an AI application. Other times it will mean talking to customers, evaluating a business, or working with a team to turn a decision into something useful. Engineering stays part of what I bring, without defining the limits of the role.

I could see that work at a private equity firm, with a team buying and combining software businesses, or inside a company working with its investors to grow. The opportunity could involve evaluating an acquisition, working through a merger, or helping a portfolio company improve its product and operations.

A **technical, business-minded Chief of Staff role** could fit too: working closely with a founder, investor, or company leader to understand a problem, weigh the options, and carry important work through. What matters to me is having a real part in the decisions, as well as responsibility for the outcome.

I've written more about this in [The Job I Want Next](https://samcouch.com/articles/the-job-i-want-next).

## Get in touch

Have a question, an idea, or something you think I'd enjoy? Say hello.

[Email Sam](mailto:sam@samcouch.com) [LinkedIn](https://www.linkedin.com/in/cscouch/) [X](https://x.com/samuelcouch)