Mate

Mate is the internal directory and culture app Jordan built for the remote team at Ryz Labs, Jordan and Sam's company. Each person gets a profile with photos, tenure, badges for company off-sites, interests teammates can join, clubs and client teams, plus a people search. Jordan built it over about a weekend with Bolt, Cursor and Supabase, and we walked through it in Episode 5 (July 25, 2025). By then it had been live for a couple of months.

Why we built it

Most of our team is remote and doesn't see each other day to day. At Amazon, Jordan used the internal "phone tool," which showed who was on your team, your manager, your manager's manager, all the way up to Jeff Bezos. It also had communities, interests and badges, and Jordan watched it become a real culture tool.

He had wanted a version for our company for a long time, but it was never the top priority. AI coding tools changed the math:

But, you know, with the development of AI, it just allowed me to develop software so much faster and quicker I built this entire app, I think, like, over a few day period of a weekend or something like that.

— Jordan Metzner, Episode 5

Sam had used something similar at a previous job, called the family tree, and said it was one of the tools he used most to learn about people he met in meetings.

The stack

• Bolt (bolt.new): scaffolded the first version and the left-hand sidebar layout.
• Supabase: the database of record, plus authentication.
• Cursor: where Jordan finished the app after taking it out of Bolt.

How we built it, step by step

1. Scaffold the front end in Bolt. Jordan used bolt.new to lay out the beginning of the app, including the left-hand sidebar.
2. Connect Supabase from inside Bolt. Bolt integrates with Supabase directly, so the database was wired up from the start.
3. Move to Cursor to finish. At 09:29 Jordan explained the handoff:

I think Bolt integrates with Supabase directly, and then you can kinda take the application out of there and finish it up in Cursor.

— Jordan Metzner, Episode 5

4. Keep everything in Supabase. All data lives in the Supabase database, and login uses Supabase authentication.
5. Add the culture features. Profiles with photos and start dates, badges for each company off-site, interests (Bitcoin, yoga, surfing, Boca Juniors and more) that others can join, clubs, client teams and search.

How it turned out

Sam said people use it all the time and keep joining interests. Some groups took off (the dog one has a lot of people, and surfing had more than he expected), while some clubs are thinly populated. Jordan's take was that those just need more engagement.

The biggest payoff is for new hires, who can find teammates with similar interests before they have met anyone. Jordan noted that the first thing you learn is usually people's dog and cat photos.

Sam's summary at 09:53:

The reason I like presenting Mate is, again, I think it's a tool that any leader, technical or nontechnical, can probably spin up in a a weekend and have a fun kind of cultural tool for their team to enjoy.

— Sam Nadler, Episode 5

What we'd do differently

• Plan for upkeep. Jordan said Mate was built "quite a while ago" and deserves a fresh coat of paint. A culture app needs updates to stay used.
• Seed the clubs. Interests spread on their own; clubs needed more of a push.

For more on the tools, see Bolt vs Claude Code and Cursor vs Lovable. Another internal tool we built on Bolt and Supabase is the Daily Check-in app.

FAQ

How do you build an internal company directory app?

Jordan scaffolded Mate in Bolt, connected it to Supabase for the database and authentication, then moved the code into Cursor to finish it. Profiles, badges, interests, clubs, teams and search all sit on Supabase.

How long does it take to build an employee directory app with AI?

Jordan built Mate over a few days of a weekend. Sam thinks any leader, technical or not, could spin up something similar in a weekend.

Why build an employee directory for a remote team?

Most of the Ryz Labs team is remote and rarely meets. Mate gives people things to bond over, like shared interests and clubs, and helps new hires learn who their teammates are.

Can you use Bolt.new with Supabase and Cursor together?

Yes. Jordan said Bolt integrates with Supabase directly, and you can take the app out of Bolt and finish it in Cursor, which is how Mate was built.