Catalyst
2025-02-01
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⏱︎ 7 min read·
I joined a founder and another developer who had gotten a working but incomplete MVP off the ground. Catalyst is a marketplace that allows students to book and pay for meetings with alumni - connecting the next generation with industry professionals who've walked the path before them.
The concept is simple but powerful: students often struggle to get real-world advice about their career paths, while alumni want to give back but don't have an easy way to connect. Catalyst bridges that gap by creating a structured platform where meaningful mentorship can happen.
The Problem
Breaking into any industry is tough. Students spend years learning theory but often lack the practical insights that only come from experience. Meanwhile, successful professionals remember their own struggles and want to help, but traditional networking events and cold LinkedIn messages aren't effective for either side.
Our Solution
Catalyst creates a marketplace where students can:
- Browse mentors by industry, company, and expertise
- Book 30-minute video sessions that fit their schedule
- Get personalized career advice from people who've been in their shoes
- Receive actionable insights and direct feedback
For mentors, the platform provides:
- A simple way to give back to the community
- Flexible scheduling that works with busy professional lives
- Compensation for their time and expertise
- The satisfaction of helping shape the next generation
The Experience
For Students
The platform makes it easy to find the right mentor for your specific needs. Whether you're trying to break into tech, consulting, finance, or any of the 20+ industries we cover, you can connect with professionals who understand your challenges.
Each session is designed to be actionable - you're not just getting general advice, but specific steps you can take to advance your career. Our mentors come from companies like OpenAI, Boeing, Deloitte, Meta, Spotify, and many others.
For Mentors
We've made the process as streamlined as possible. Set your availability, share your expertise, and connect with motivated students who are serious about their careers. The platform handles scheduling, payments, and all the logistics so you can focus on what matters - sharing your knowledge and experience.
Collaborative Development
One of the interesting aspects of this project was navigating working with another developer's repository. This meant understanding their existing codebase, coding patterns, and development workflow. I had to get comfortable with committing code changes to feature branches, creating detailed pull requests, and working through the merge process with code reviews. It was a great experience in collaborative development - learning to communicate changes clearly, handle merge conflicts, and maintain code quality standards across a team.
What I Worked On
Joining an existing project meant understanding the current architecture and identifying where I could add the most value. The homepage and skill selection functionality already existed, but I helped improve upon the foundation and added several key features:
Availability Selection & Timezone Handling
I added availability selection including complex timezone handling for alumni to be able to be booked with students, as well as set their rates. Because it was too soon to integrate people's calendars (future feature), I needed to create the SIMPLEST and easiest UI for people to add their availability and edit it as they needed. Had to relentlessly test timezones on both sides to ensure what mentors set as available actually matched what students could book.
Stripe Payment Integration
I integrated Stripe for payments, pulling through alumni selected pricing. Initially started with just a booking link but this required a static price and didn't allow us to pass parameters such as success events or other necessary payment logging, so went with a more integrated solution. This ensures secure transactions and allows mentors to set their own rates while students can pay confidently through a trusted payment platform.
Google Calendar Integration
I used Google Calendar API to programmatically send hidden invitee invites to both parties so they could join the meeting but not have emails leaked. Needed to convert timezones properly, add Google Meet links automatically, and send invites to both participants. This maintains privacy while ensuring both participants have the meeting details in their calendars with the correct meeting link.
Success Celebrations
And when all that was done, I went through and added some pizzazz, like confetti on a successful booking! These small touches make the user experience more delightful and memorable.
Looking Forward
Career guidance shouldn't be limited to who you know or which school you attended. Catalyst democratizes access to mentorship, creating opportunities for students from all backgrounds to connect with industry leaders and accelerate their career journey.
The marketplace model works because it aligns incentives - students are invested in making the most of their sessions, and mentors are motivated to provide real value. It's a win-win that scales beyond traditional networking limitations.