Why this matters
Some reports you write the same way every week: the Friday job report, the monthly summary, the site visit write-up. Each time you dig out last week’s version, explain the layout again and fix the same mistakes.
A skill of your own fixes that for good. You do not have to write it: Claude’s skill creator interviews you, drafts the skill, tests it on real notes and packages it for you.
In this module you build a weekly job report skill, check the description that tells Claude when to use it, try it on this week’s notes, improve it once and see the better report.
What you’ll build
For Brightline Painting, a made-up painting company: a weekly-job-report skill that turns crews’ day-by-day notes into the standard report (week at a glance, jobs with crew hours, problems and follow-ups, next week, calls to make).
You save the skill, run it with Try in chat, ask for one change in the chat where you built it, click Update, and a plain request then picks the skill by itself.
What you need
- Nothing to start the practiceClaude is a practice copy, and a real week of crew notes is ready to paste.
- A Claude account, to do it for realclaude.ai, with Code execution and file creation on in Settings, Capabilities (see What are Claude Skills?).
- One job you repeatA report, quote or summary you write the same way each time, plus one real example of the notes it starts from. Take out private details first.
Concepts
3 ideas you’ll use in the practice.
Let Claude interview you
In Customize, Skills, choose + Add, then Create with Claude. Describe the job in a few lines, then answer Claude’s questions: what goes in, what comes out, the sections, what to flag.
Have a real example ready. A skill drafted and tested on real notes is far better than one written from memory.
The description decides when it runs
Every skill has a short description that tells Claude when to use it ("use when the user pastes crew notes or asks for the weekly report"). Read it before you save.
If the description is too narrow, the skill never kicks in. Too broad, and it shows up in the wrong chats.
Improve it every time it is not quite right
When a report comes out wrong, go back to the chat where you built the skill, say what to change, and click Update so the new version replaces the old one.
Keep each skill to one job. A quote skill and a report skill are easier to fix than one skill that does both.
Practice
Do every step yourself in a practice copy of the real tool. It checks your work, and “Do it for me” finishes any step you get stuck on.
Do it for real
Now repeat it in your own account. Tick each step as you go.
Quick check
3 questions to check you’ve got it.
1. What does a skill’s description do?
- It is the report’s title
- It tells Claude when to use the skill
- It is only for other people to read
Show the answer
It tells Claude when to use the skill. Claude reads the description to decide whether a request needs that skill.
2. The report keeps leaving out crew hours. What is the best fix?
- Add the hours by hand every week
- Ask for the change in the builder chat and click Update
- Delete the skill and start again
Show the answer
Ask for the change in the builder chat and click Update. Updating the skill fixes every future report, not just this one.
3. Why build the skill from a real week of notes?
- Claude cannot work without one
- The draft is tested on the kind of notes it will really get
- It makes the skill longer
Show the answer
The draft is tested on the kind of notes it will really get. Testing on real notes catches problems before you rely on the skill.
Use case: messy export to clean Excel workbook
Next in this course: Use case: messy export to clean Excel workbook.
Start module 6 →