From Problem to Product: Building AI Recess & Winning SheBuilds Season 01

Quick Overview

Cat Hill Contag secured the B2B win in SheBuilds Season 01 by developing "AI Recess," a platform conceived from her consulting experience identifying the gap between management's desire for AI adoption and team members lacking time or budget to learn, framing the tool as "the Duolingo for learning how to use AI at work."

Key Points: Cat Hill Contag, a non-technical founder focused on go-to-market and sales, overcame limiting beliefs to participate in SheBuilds Season 1, which she says "changed my life" and pivoted her career to only consulting for clients wanting to build with Lovable. The winning product, AI Recess, solves the problem where managers want teams to use AI but team members lack time or budget to experiment, positioning the tool as "the Duolingo for learning how to use AI at work." Contag highly recommends structuring builds using a Product Requirements Document (PRD), noting that skipping this step for her survey builder cost her three hours of debugging, emphasizing that 30-45 minutes spent on a PRD saves significant time later. She uses a "PTO framework"—Pain point identification, Time estimation of waste, and User openness to adoption—to decide which problems are worth solving with Lovable, prioritizing tangible, recurring pain points. Contag advises building a 'vibe coding team' that includes external resources like Claude for debugging assistance and Dribbble for design inspiration, and treating Lovable itself as the fourth team member. A key technical best practice is utilizing Lovable's 'plan now' button before prompting to save credits and review proposed actions, and if hitting roadblocks, opening a completely new browser session to re-prompt. The biggest win from the hackathon was the community and learning, not the prize; Contag stresses that builders should not feel obligated to monetize or quit their jobs, as the win can simply be building something useful for oneself or a community.

Context: The webinar features Lovable Community Manager Whitney Menareek introducing Cat Hill Contag, the B2B winner of SheBuilds Season 1. Cat shares her journey from being a non-technical fractional consultant to winning the hackathon, detailing the process of identifying a build problem, utilizing the Lovable platform, and structuring a successful project within the intense 48-hour competition format.