Our story
A thousand years ago, monasteries, guilds, and estates faced a problem every modern organization would recognize: their most important knowledge — charters, deeds, land grants, agreements, obligations — lived in scattered documents and in the memories of a few people. When those people left, the knowledge left with them.
Their answer was the cartulary: a bound volume into which an institution's vital records were carefully copied, organized, and preserved. The cartulary made an organization's knowledge durable, findable, and usable by the people who came after.
AI agents and agent skills are the modern-day cartulary. They capture your institutional and domain expertise — the way your organization actually works — and put it to work: standardized, transparent, and available to everyone in your organization, every day.
That conviction shapes how we engage. Adopting AI is not simply an IT project — it is a work style and a strategy. We help leadership make agentic AI a core capability and differentiator, with an AI strategy woven into the core of a sustainable business strategy. The organizations that do this won't just keep pace with their peers; they'll lead and shape tomorrow's market.
Who we are
Cartulary, LLC was founded by two leaders in AI and higher education who have spent their careers building AI capability inside large, complex organizations — and teaching others to do the same.
Jesse Spencer-Smith, Ph.D.
Co-founder
Jesse is Director of the Data Science Institute and Program Director of the Master of Science in Artificial Intelligence at Vanderbilt University, where he also serves as Associate Dean for Partnerships and Innovation and Professor of the Practice of Computer Science. Before Vanderbilt, he spent nearly a decade leading data science in health care, ultimately as Director of Data Science at HCA Healthcare. His expertise spans generative and foundation models, applied machine learning, and clinical analytics, and he has designed and delivered AI instruction for the U.S. Army Senior Executive Service, the Army Corps of Engineers, U.S. Cyber Command and the NSA, and Congressional staff.
Download full bio (PDF)Joanne Wang, Ed.D.
Co-founder
Joanne is Associate Dean and Executive Director of Strategic Partnerships at the Vanderbilt University School of Engineering, where she also serves as Associate Professor of the Practice in Engineering Management. She leads the school's external engagement and partnership development across government, industry, and community stakeholders, spanning a $90 million research and education enterprise. She has designed customized executive education and technical training for clients including the Army Senior Executive Service, the Army Corps of Engineers, L3Harris, Lockheed Martin, Honeywell, Nissan, and Infineon, with expertise in strategic business development, workforce competency forecasting, and organizational innovation.
Download full bio (PDF)