Hi, I'm

Laura Pedrosa

I'm a product lead at a small startup. I figure out what customers need and help get it built.

10+ years · 15+ releases tested · 20+ features shaped by research · 4,000 soccer community members

Brooklyn, NY Tech, consulting & nonprofits LinkedIn ↗

Right now

Product Lead at Zenda Technologies

It's a small team, so I cover a lot of ground: roadmap, tickets, QA, and release work. I also merge my own fixes using Claude Code. When our engineering team changed twice, I kept the product side steady so releases stayed on schedule.

Since I started

  • 200+ Jira tickets written, including the epics that set the roadmap
  • 26 PRs merged across 4 repos, from UI fixes to document upload
  • Regression testing cut from a week to two days

How I got here

From art history to product

  1. 2014

    Art history

    University of Richmond

    I studied Art History and Arts Management. I learned to look closely at something and explain why it matters, which is still most of my job.

  2. 2014 to 2020

    Nonprofit development

    Pathfinder International · JA Worldwide

    I worked in development operations and grant management, the behind-the-scenes side of fundraising. That meant reports, donor communications, and a lot of making systems work for busy people.

    • Built a reporting framework adopted by 50+ offices
    • Launched JA Worldwide's first monthly donor newsletter
    • Ran communications for the 100th Anniversary Gala
  3. 2020 to 2022

    Design school

    Carnegie Mellon · PNC Bank

    I kept caring more about how the tools worked for the people using them, so I went back to school for a master's in Interaction Design.

    • Product design internship at PNC Bank
    • Learned to treat research as the starting point, not a checkbox
  4. 2022 to 2025

    Consulting

    Zenda Consulting

    Zenda started as a consulting firm. I put research and design to work on real business problems, for clients who needed answers they could act on.

    • Found $400K in cost savings in an operations study for a global CPG company
    • Led a 4-month product redesign that led to a $500K follow-on contract
    • Ran workshops to get a room full of stakeholders to agree on what to build
  5. 2024 to now

    Product

    Zenda Technologies

    Then Zenda made the jump from consulting to building its own product as a startup, and I moved over with it. Now I lead product, where all of it comes together: listening to customers, shaping what we build, and seeing it ship.

    • Met with customers 2 to 3 times a week to hear what was and wasn't working
    • Ran research that shaped 20+ feature improvements
    • Wrote the biweekly product updates for investors and users

Education

MPS, Interaction Design · MA, Design

Carnegie Mellon University

2020 – 2022

BA, Art History & Arts Management

University of Richmond

2014

Outside work

Prospect Park Soccer

I'm the head organizer of a volunteer-run soccer community in Brooklyn with 4,000 members. We play every week, all year. It's one of the things I'm most proud of.

Commonwealth School

I'm on the Board of Trustees at my old high school and serve on the Development Committee. I was also part of an admissions task force.