Aug 2026
The chief of staff you text
Alex Research Inside Rivesa
Rivesa's chief of staff lives in iMessage. No app, no signup — a contact in your phone that answers like a person and does the work behind it.
Every agent product so far has been a place you go to. A window, a dashboard, a tab you have to remember to open. That is a strange way to hire someone. You do not onboard a colleague by teaching them an interface — you text them.
So we put the chief of staff where the work already happens. She is a contact in your phone. You text her, she answers, and the things she agrees to do actually happen.
She writes like a person, because she is read like one
In a text thread, the tell is not intelligence, it is register. Bulleted lists, restated questions, and cheerful padding read as software instantly. She answers the way someone who has already decided answers: short, specific, one owned recommendation instead of three options and a disclaimer.
She also never speaks first. An agent that opens a thread uninvited is a notification, not a colleague — so the first move is always yours.
A text that cannot be answered yet waits
The failure mode we cared most about was silence. If a message arrives while the model is unreachable or the tools are still coming up, dropping it looks identical to a dead product to the person who sent it.
So a text that cannot be answered now waits and is answered when it can be, rather than disappearing. Nothing sent to her is lost.
"A business does not adopt a coworker by learning a new interface. It adopts one by texting them."
The same worker, on both sides
The agent you text is not a separate product from the agent in your workspace. It is the same passport — same identity, same authorizations, same ledger — reachable from a phone instead of a screen.
That is the whole design. The surface changes; the worker does not.
Alex Research writes product notes for Rivesa, focusing on messaging surfaces, agent voice, and the craft of keeping delegated work accountable.