A 2-hour hands-on session for business owners who want AI working for them today. Not after the next webinar.
Claude Code is the third flavour — built for developers writing software. We're not covering it today.
Anthropic launched Claude in March 2023 as a conversational AI. Great for quick questions and one-off tasks — but every session started from scratch. No memory, no files, no context carried over.
Launched as a research preview in February 2025, generally available in May 2025. Powerful for writing software — but built for developers. Not designed for business owners who just want to sort their inbox.
Anthropic launched Cowork in January 2026 as a desktop AI agent for work tasks. Projects, persistent memory, file access, and automations. Finally, AI that works the way a business owner actually needs it to.
These are the workflows we see business owners build first. Pick one. Get it running. Then add the next.
Explain how you write. Paste tone rules. Tweak the same paragraph. Every time you open a thread, you're back at square one.
Ask for the outcome — the draft, the reply, the report. Your files and Skills hold the context, so you're not narrating your business from scratch every session.
This is the one thing people wish they'd set up properly from the start. Reorganising later is a pain.
I want to build a [NAME] Skill.
Do not save skill files to the temp outputs directory. Save the .skill file and .md file inside the [Source subfolder / Path] and create a subfolder for this skill under [Source/Path].
Every run, read all files from the [name of the subfolders] before doing anything. Derive my [explain things like audience, tone, banned phrases, and content angles relevant to the skill]. Do not use memory from previous runs.
[Write exactly what this Skill should produce every run — count, format, columns, rules, and any constraints. Plain language. No ambiguity.]
Save the output file in the [subfolder name/Path].
I want to build a LinkedIn Post Generator Skill.
Do not save skill files to the temp outputs directory. Save the .skill file and .md file inside the Source subfolder and create a subfolder for this skill under Source.
Every run, read all files from the Business and Brand/Voice subfolders before doing anything. Derive my audience, tone, banned phrases, and content angles from those files. Do not use memory from previous runs.
Generate 7 LinkedIn posts. Every batch must include one educational how-to post. Derive the remaining pillars from my context files. No pillar repeats in a batch.
If I provide a topic or draft, build 4–5 posts around it and 2–3 complementary ones. Otherwise generate 7 fresh posts.
Every post uses the PRISM framework. 180–260 words. Short paragraphs. At least 2 posts must reference a specific tool, dollar amount, or time saving.
After each post, write 3 visual briefs: typographic, diagram/comparison, and bold statement.
Append all 7 to the CSV with columns: Date, Post_Number, Pillar, Hook, Full_Copy, Visual_A, Visual_B, Visual_C, Mode, User_Draft_Input. Never overwrite. Save the CSV in the [subfolder name/Path]
Your Skill is only as sharp as the context you give it. If your folder is empty, paste this template into a doc, fill in each line, and drop it in. That's your starter brain.
Build me a morning email briefing skill. Every morning, I want it to read my [Gmail] from the last 48 hours (read-only, never mark anything as read), categorise every email into one of these buckets: Urgent, Client, New Enquiry, Personal/Network, [AI] Newsletter, Other/Noise. For each email it should pull the sender, subject, timestamp, a 1-2 sentence summary, and a clear action if one exists. For newsletter specifically, write a 2-3 sentence gist of the actual content with any tools, models or ideas worth knowing about.
Save the .skill file and companion .md under Source/, inside an appropriate subfolder dedicated to this skill (create it if it does not exist).
Then produce a single self-contained HTML file saved to Claude-Cowork/Automations/Ops & Analytics with: a header overview of the day's inbox, tab buttons to filter by category, email cards with action checkboxes, a keyword search bar, a simple bar chart of email distribution by category, and a tight 2-3 sentence summary of the most urgent things I need to act on today. The visual design must stay consistent on every run: keep the same typography, color system, spacing, and layout patterns; only refresh the underlying content for that day.
The file should work as static HTML by default, with JS only used for filtering and interactivity. No external dependencies. Mobile-friendly. Use today's date in the filename.
Run this everyday at [9am] automatically on schedule.
Add your first content workflow. Use the LinkedIn batch system you built today. One week of posts at a time.
Run your email briefing daily. Don't add anything new yet. Just build the habit of opening Cowork first thing.
Pick one repetitive task you do every week. Write the prompt. Add the workflow. Ship it. Repeat.
These slides are yours to keep. Any questions — you know where to find us.