Vibe-a-thon

A one-day AI hackathon that ends in a demo, not a deck.

Your people take the problems they already work around and demo a working prototype by 5pm. Mixed teams, no coding experience needed. Then 90 days of Nurture and Deploy to take the strongest into production.

Set up your own workspace in about a minute, no date needed yet.

80 people
1 day
40+ ideas → working prototypes

A whole company, run through it in a single day.

What the day looks like for you

Pick the seat you’ll be in.

You’re hosting this one.

You set the vision for the day and the three to five themes ideas should serve. Every participant’s AI assistant runs on them, so the room’s ideas ladder up to what you actually care about. By the end of the day: a portfolio of prototypes, a ranked idea backlog, and champions with names. Then Nurture and Deploy carry the best builds to production over the following 30 to 90 days.

“Amazing. Can we ship it? Serious question.”

— Director of Finance, mid-demo
What is a Vibe-a-thon?

A one-day AI hackathon where the people with the problem build the fix.

Mixed teams, no coding experience needed, turn the problems they already work around into working prototypes with AI. Most of it happens before anyone walks into a room: the ideas are raised, argued over and staffed online in the weeks before, in cohorts of 10 to 150.

In the weeks before

Online, in FreshVibe
01

Set the vision

A leader names what the day is for, and the three to five themes ideas should serve.

02

Shape an idea

You talk to the AI about the part of your job that drags. It shapes a brief with you.

03

Read and vote

Every brief goes up for the cohort. People read them, comment, and vote for the strongest.

04

Team up

Teams form around the top briefs, matched to the skills each one still needs.

On the day

In the room, together
05

Build

Describe what you want in plain English. AI builds it with you, live.

06

Demo

Show the room what you built. Watch it land, and pick up your colleagues’ ideas for where it goes next.

Inside FreshVibe

A look inside, no sign-in needed.

FreshVibe is where the ideas get shaped in the weeks before the event. Here is the whole idea phase, five screens from a real workspace, so you can see how it works before you talk to anyone.

  1. 01 · Set the vision

    The host frames the day

    A leader writes what the day is for and the themes ideas should serve. Those go into the prompt every participant’s assistant runs on, so ideas arrive pointed at what the business actually cares about.

    The FreshVibe event vision screen, titled “Set the vision & themes”, showing the host’s vision for the day above three strategic themes, each with a priority and a note on why it matters.
  2. 02 · Shape an idea

    Describe the problem

    You talk about the part of your job that drags. FreshVibe asks questions back and shapes a brief alongside the conversation.

    The FreshVibe Explore screen. On the left, someone describes rebuilding the same operations report by hand every Monday. On the right, a draft opportunity brief assembles itself with a title, summary, problem and impact.
  3. 02 · Shape an idea

    Publish the brief

    Every field stays editable, including which theme it serves. Nothing goes up until it sounds like your week rather than the AI’s guess at it.

    The brief review screen, titled “Review and publish”, with editable fields for title, strategic theme, summary, problem and impact. The theme is set to “Cut manual reporting time”.
  4. 03 · Read and vote

    The cohort picks the strongest

    Briefs go up where everyone can read them. People comment, sharpen each other’s thinking, and vote, so the ideas with real support rise before anyone books a day.

    The prioritisation board, titled “Vote on the strongest opportunities”, showing a grid of submitted briefs with vote and comment counts.
  5. 04 · Team up

    Teams form around the winners

    Each brief shows what it is short of: needs an engineer, needs the expert who lives the problem, still solo. People join where their skills are the missing piece.

    The team formation screen, titled “Form balanced teams”, with each brief tagged balanced, needs balance or solo, the skill it still needs, and a “Join team” button.

By the morning of the event, every team already knows what it is building and who is on it. The build and the demo are all that is left, and they happen in the room.

Rome2Rio
Case study

We ran 80 people at Rome2Rio through a whole-company Vibe-a-thon

Over 40 refined ideas turned into prototypes and deployed tools in a single day. See how the platform and facilitation came together, and what the team built.

Read the case study
The day is day one

You don’t build the future in a day. You start it in one.

Programmes run 30, 60 or 90 days beyond the event.

Nurture

Every build tracked to completion, adoption and value, with a weekly portfolio view for leadership.

Deploy

Security, architecture and eval reviews take the biggest bets into production.

  • Single sign-on
  • Your ideas stay yours
  • Our cloud or yours

Lasting change. Not a sugar high.

Your facilitators

Run by people who do this for a living.

  • Ben, Freshwater Futures
    Ben AI advisor · 20+ yrs enterprise software
  • Brad, Freshwater Futures
    Brad Behaviour scientist · why adoption sticks
  • Zoe, Freshwater Futures
    Zoe Product designer & AI adoption coach
Getting started

Up and running in three steps.

About a minute from here to a workspace your whole team can join.

  1. 01

    Your workspace opens

    Named for your event, yours to share.

  2. 02

    Set the vision and themes

    What the day is for, and what ideas should serve.

  3. 03

    Invite the team

    They start shaping briefs the same day.

Ready when you are

The next “we should do something with AI” meeting could be a demo instead.

We facilitate Vibe-a-thons for cohorts of 10 to 150. Or set your own workspace up now, and pick the date later.

Questions

Frequently asked questions

What actually happens in the weeks before the day?

Four things, all online. A leader sets the vision for the day and three to five strategic themes. Everyone talks to the AI about a problem they live with, and it shapes that into a structured brief. The briefs go up where the whole cohort can read them, comment, and vote. Then teams form around the strongest briefs, based on the skills each one still needs.

Who decides what people work on?

You do, at the level that matters. The vision and themes a leader sets go into the prompt every participant’s AI assistant runs on, so ideas arrive pointed at what the business cares about. People still raise their own problems, which is the point, and the cohort votes on which ones get built.

Does everyone need coding experience?

No. Vibe-a-thon is designed for anyone. Marketers, operations, leadership, product managers, and engineers all participate together. The AI tools do the heavy lifting.

How many people can take part?

Cohorts run from 10 to 150. Teams form in the weeks before, around the ideas that gather the most support.

What if a team’s idea is too ambitious?

Facilitators help scope ideas to what’s achievable in a day. The goal is a working prototype, not production perfection.

Can we run this across multiple locations?

Yes, we can facilitate distributed Vibe-a-thons, but the energy works best in person. Hybrid setups are possible but require careful facilitation.

What if someone doesn’t want to code?

Many people participate in non-coding roles: product thinking, design, project management, or as a cheerleader for their team. Everyone contributes.