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Engineering leadership
Brings experience leading software teams, delivery rhythms, cross-functional planning, and pragmatic technical decisions.
Hiring Profile
Joe Billman, Software Development Leader
Northern Utah-based Principal Engineer in AI and Innovation, founder, and product-minded full-stack engineer with 20+ years of experience across EdTech, web apps, games, mobile, and desktop. I combine engineering leadership with practical AI agents, automation, and custom software.
Short Answer
Who is Joe Billman?
Joe Billman is a software development leader in Northern Utah. He is currently Principal Engineer in AI and Innovation at Reading Horizons, founder and owner of NexSolvo LLC, and founder and lead engineer of BrainFusion Learning.
At Reading Horizons, he works with departments to understand their workflows, identify opportunities for automation, and build AI agents and custom software. He also trains employees to use agentic workflows in their day-to-day work.
His background includes serving as Director of Software Development from 2015 to 2026 and growing from computer operator to development team lead in his first programming job. He brings that combination of hands-on engineering, team leadership, and product judgment to new problems.
Core Strengths
What Joe brings to a team
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Hands-on full-stack work
Builds with TypeScript, React, Node.js, PostgreSQL, .NET, Astro, Cloudflare, Vercel, and modern AI-assisted workflows.
03
Product judgment
Connects user needs, product strategy, architecture, and shipping discipline instead of treating engineering as an isolated function.
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Learning technology depth
Has built EdTech products, learning games, study tools, multiplayer quiz experiences, and internal platforms for engineering teams.
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AI, agents, and automation
Works with departments to understand workflow challenges and build practical solutions using AI agents, automation, and custom software.
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Employee enablement
Trains employees to use agentic workflows in their day-to-day work, connecting new tools with the problems people need to solve.
Portfolio Evidence
Why this positioning is credible
Explore the products, technical decisions, and career history behind this work. Start with Skills & Craft for a guided view of the tools I use and the work they support.
Current role: AI and innovation
Principal Engineer in AI and Innovation at Reading Horizons since October 2026, helping departments solve business problems through AI, automation, and custom software.
Engineering leadership experience
Director of Software Development at Reading Horizons from 2015 to 2026, leading software engineers, contributing to product delivery, and coordinating across teams.
Founder track
Founder and owner of NexSolvo LLC and founder and lead engineer of BrainFusion Learning, combining AI-powered content creation with game-based learning and principles from the science of learning.
Builder range
Portfolio spans web apps, mobile apps, desktop tools, games, e-learning products, AI-enabled workflows, and developer tools.
Local context
Based in Syracuse, Northern Utah, with professional roots across Davis County, Ogden, Kaysville, and the Wasatch Front.
Leadership in practice
Three people.
Web and mobile.
A pilot on time.
FranklinCovey · Loyalty · 2013–2015
At FranklinCovey, our Loyalty team had three people: me on the front end, a back-end developer, and a systems administrator. I joined when the web application was roughly one-third complete, finished its front end, and created the iOS and Android mobile version.
- The scope
- Give customers mobile access to the same customer-satisfaction data they used on the desktop web application, with a small team and limited native app experience.
- The architectural decision
- I used ActionScript 3.0, Flex, and Adobe AIR to share most of the code across platforms, keeping device-specific interface differences in separate files.
- The delivered work
- We shipped a pilot and met our deadlines. Internal stakeholders and participating companies responded enthusiastically. I left shortly afterward, so my firsthand account ends with the pilot.
How that carries forward
I carried that hands-on approach into my work as Director of Software Development at Reading Horizons, where I also used Adobe AIR to deliver the companion iPad games app in 2015. Today, as Principal Engineer in AI and Innovation, I partner with departments to solve problems through AI agents, automation, and custom software, and train employees to use agentic workflows in their day-to-day work.
Next Step
Looking for a product-minded engineering leader?
Start with the resume for role history, the projects page for product examples, or contact Joe directly for engineering leadership, portfolio, consulting, and collaboration conversations.