Travis Hellstrom
Author. Builder. Calm under pressure.
The person your friends call when something important needs to get done well, with judgment, context, and without drama. I've spent the last fifteen years building things that help people think more clearly, lead more humanely, and move good work forward, across writing, tools, communities, and client systems.
Featured Work - Live Access
The Daily Optimist Workshop
This is a project I'm especially proud of, and it reflects the kind of thoughtful, hands-on building I'd love to do with the Sudowrite team. It combines original research, daily writing practice, and a book-in-progress into a workshop built for real use, iteration, and feedback.
URL: optimist.travishellstrom.com/workshop
Username: sudowrite Password: heyyouguys
Open the Workshop →
What I'd Do in This Role
Protect your attention, turn loose ideas into finished systems, prepare meetings and decisions before they become bottlenecks, handle follow-through across people and projects, and steadily automate recurring work so the role gets stronger over time.
I already use AI every day to reduce friction, handle repetition, triage information, and make sure human attention goes where it matters most. When you say the most important job is automating your own job, that feels immediately familiar to me.
I also noticed your emphasis on impeccable attention to detail. I didn't find an error worth performing for, but I did notice the "Ginni at Author Nation" photo caption without context, and I appreciated it. It felt human, which made me trust the posting more, not less.
Writing & Ideas
My personal site, home to my books, essays, life philosophy, and 20+ years of public writing.
An interactive publishing project built to help my publishers at Hatherleigh Press and Penguin Random House explore, comment on, and shape a growing body of work.
I wanted a tool that would let my community help me write my next book on Leonardo da Vinci, so I built it myself. Part book-in-progress, part collaborative workshop.
A retreat and community coworking space we built in our small Vermont town in the years before the pandemic.
Academic research on what helps people thrive at work, with a focus on businesses doing good in the world and shared leadership models.
People & Communities
A recognition project celebrating everyday fathers doing the quiet, unglamorous, important work. This started in Mongolia following Peace Corps.
Co-founded the first TEDx event in Mongolia in 2011. It's grown to 30+ events and brought together Mongolian thought leaders, educators, and innovators across the country.
A humanitarian consultancy I founded focused on leadership development and systems change for mission-driven organizations.
Recent Client Work
Recruiting Firm Digital Rebuild
Rebuilt the digital operations for a boutique executive recruiting firm — email infrastructure, outreach systems, candidate tracking, and deliverability. Took a scattered manual process to a clean, repeatable system.
Built a custom email newsletter and content pipeline for a bestselling author. Includes subscriber management, a 54-week drip sequence, and a production pipeline tracker.
Designed and built a content hub for an author building a public presence: positioning strategy, site structure, and social content foundation.
Book promotion page with author bio, book listings, and reader engagement.
Subscriber-facing newsletter landing page — sign-up flow, welcome sequence, and archive for weekly content.
Built the public-facing site and grant application system for a nonprofit focused on inspiring the next generation of dreamers.