Sistava

Build a Custom Employee

Create an AI employee around the work your business actually needs, whether you begin with a ready-made role or a blank Employee Builder role.

TL;DR

Employee Builder lets you create an AI employee for a role that does not exist in the Marketplace. Start with the closest ready-made employee and adjust it, or hire Custom AI Talent to define the name, persona, skills, duties, tools, routines, and schedule from scratch. Brief the employee in chat once the setup matches the job, then refine it as you learn what the role needs.

Choose Your Starting Point

There are two good ways to create a custom role:

Start here Best when What you do next
A ready-made employee A Marketplace role already covers most of the work Hire it, then change the persona, skills, duties, tools, routines, or schedule
Custom AI Talent The work is unique to your business or does not fit a standard role Hire the blank role and build its setup from the employee dashboard

Use a ready-made employee when it gives you a useful head start. Use Custom AI Talent when the job itself needs a fresh definition. Employee Builder is available on the Custom plan.

How It Works

  1. Open Marketplace and find the closest ready-made employee, or select Custom AI Talent.
  2. Click Hire. The employee opens in its chat and dashboard.
  3. Open the employee dashboard to set the role, persona, skills, duties, and tools.
  4. Add routines or schedules for recurring work.
  5. Brief the employee in chat with the first outcome you need.
  6. Review the work, then refine the setup until the role fits.

What It Can Do

A custom employee can own a repeatable role that combines the parts of your business that normally live across checklists, apps, and reminders. Common examples include:

The role is not defined by its title alone. It is defined by the setup you give it and the work you continue to direct in chat.

How to Set It Up

Set the role and persona

Open Profile and give the employee a clear name, role, and persona. The role explains what it owns. The persona sets how it communicates with you and the people it works with.

Add skills

Open Skills and assign the step-by-step playbooks the employee needs. Skills are how you turn a repeatable process into a consistent way of working.

Set duties

Open Duties and define the standing expectations that apply to every task. Use duties for things such as approval boundaries, quality standards, escalation rules, and the tone the employee should maintain.

Connect tools

Open Tools and connect only the apps and services the role needs. A role that manages client onboarding might need your mailbox and calendar. A research role might need web search and your company knowledge.

Add routines and schedules

Use Routines and Schedule for work that must happen regularly. A routine gives the employee a recurring responsibility. A schedule decides when it runs, such as every weekday morning or once a week before a review meeting.

Brief Them in Chat

After setup, chat with the employee as you would a teammate. Give it the outcome, context, and constraints that matter.

For example: “Every Monday, review the new partner applications, flag anything incomplete, and prepare a short summary for me to review.”

The employee setup gives that conversation a durable job definition. Change the setup whenever the role changes, then keep using chat to direct the real work.

Tips and Tricks

Good to Know

FAQ

Q: Can I build a role that is not in the Marketplace? A: Yes. Hire Custom AI Talent with Employee Builder, then define the role from scratch through its persona, skills, duties, tools, routines, and schedule.

Q: Can I edit a ready-made employee instead? A: Yes. Hire the closest ready-made role, then adjust its name, persona, skills, duties, tools, routines, and schedule from its dashboard.

Q: Does the employee configure itself from a chat conversation? A: The employee uses chat to receive and carry out your work. Configure its durable role, skills, duties, tools, routines, and schedule from the employee dashboard.

Q: Can I change the setup later? A: Yes. Update the employee dashboard whenever the role, process, tools, or expectations change.

Q: Who can use Employee Builder? A: Employee Builder is available on the Custom plan. Other plans can hire ready-made Marketplace roles and customize them after hiring.