# About Sistava

Sistava is where you hire a team of AI employees, onboard them, and bring them in as an extension of your real team. They work together day to day and show up wherever the work happens, in chat, on email, in Slack, and on calls.

## TL;DR

Think of it as your company's AI workforce. You hire individual AI employees or pre-built teams, customize what they know and do, and they handle work for you continuously. Every employee has its own chat, tasks, drive, skills, tools, and schedule. Teams have a leader who coordinates specialists. The Company layer gives you organization-wide oversight.

## What You Get

| Surface | What It Does |
|---------|--------------|
| **Employee** | An AI worker with a persona, model, skills, duties, tools, schedule, drive, and chat. Day-to-day work happens here. |
| **Team** | A group of employees with a leader who delegates to specialists. One conversation, many workers behind it. |
| **Company** | Organization-wide view: members, billing, integrations, policies, dashboards. |
| **Marketplace** | Pre-built AI employees ready to hire in one click. |

## How It Works

1. **Sign up.** Free plan, 1,000 credits, no card required.
2. **Hire** from the Marketplace, an individual or a full team.
3. **Configure** the employee's skills, duties, tools, and schedule.
4. **Talk to it** in chat, email, voice, or Slack. The employee runs continuously, follows its schedule, and reports back.
5. **Pay** in credits. Credits cover model usage, tool calls, and integrations. Plans add monthly credit allowances and feature unlocks.

## Where to Go Next

| If you want to | Open |
|----------------|------|
| Get your first employee running in 5 minutes | [Quick Start](/guide/getting-started/quick-start) |
| Learn the workspace layout | [Navigate Your Workspace](/guide/getting-started/workspace-navigation) |
| Browse pre-built AI employees | [Marketplace](/guide/getting-started/marketplace) |
| Understand skills, duties, and tools | [Capabilities](/guide/capabilities) |

## Frequently Asked Questions

**Q: What is the difference between an employee and a team?**
A team is a group of employees coordinated by a leader. You talk to the leader and the leader delegates to specialists. An employee is a single AI worker you talk to directly.

**Q: Do I need technical skills to use Sistava?**
No. Hiring, configuring, and chatting are all done through the workspace UI. Developers can also extend employees with custom MCP servers, webhooks, and API endpoints.

**Q: Where do AI employees run?**
On Sistava's cloud. They keep running on their schedule even when you are offline. Voice, email, and Slack channels work continuously.

**Q: How do I pay for usage?**
Credits. Each plan includes a monthly credit allowance. You can also buy credit packs. Model calls, tool calls, and integration usage all draw from the same balance.

**Q: Can I bring my own AI model?**
Yes. The Models settings let you pick the model per employee, including Claude, GPT, and others. Some advanced overrides are gated by plan.