Before We Start
Default Claude is a flip phone
Most people open Claude, type a question, and copy-paste the answer somewhere else. That's using Claude like a search engine. It technically works, the same way a flip phone technically makes calls. It's also using maybe 10% of what's actually there.
The 5 moves below take about 20 minutes combined, done once. After that, Claude already knows who you are, can act inside your real tools, writes in your actual voice, and is already running one task for you in the background. That's the difference between Google-with-extra-steps and an assistant that works alongside you.
The Map
All 5, at a glance
Here's the full path before we go deep on each one. Do them in order, the later moves build on the earlier ones.
Switch to Cowork, not Chat
Cowork works out of an actual folder on your computer. It reads files, writes new ones, remembers what it did last session, and takes multi-step actions instead of you being the middleman.
Tell Claude who you are
Paste the interview prompt. Claude asks you a series of questions, then writes your global instructions. Paste those into settings and every future chat already knows you.
Connect all your tools
Settings then Connectors. Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Notion, Slack, whatever you actually use. If it is not listed, google the tool name plus "MCP connector."
Give Claude your writing samples
Drop in 5-10 examples: emails, texts, LinkedIn posts, Slack messages. Claude builds a voice profile it references every time it writes as you.
Ask Claude to build your first automation
The one that surprises people. Claude now knows you. Have it find the highest-leverage thing to automate and build it, instead of you hunting for a tutorial.
Move 1
Cowork, not Chat
If you're just typing questions into a little chat box and copy-pasting the answers back into your work, you're capped at what a single message can do. Cowork is a different mode entirely. It works out of an actual folder on your computer. It can read your files, write new ones, and remember what it did last session. It connects to your tools and takes multi-step actions on its own, instead of you being the middleman between every single step.
Stop treating Claude like a search bar. Switch over to Cowork and let it work alongside you instead of just answering you.
How to switch
In the Claude desktop app, switch from Chat to Cowork in the top left. Create one dedicated folder on your computer, drag it in, and click Allow. That folder is now the working home base Claude reads from and writes to every session.
Move 2 — Prompt 1
Tell Claude who you are
Don't sit down and try to write your own instructions from a blank page, you'll forget half the things that actually matter. Paste this into a fresh chat and let Claude interview you instead. It'll ask a series of questions, then hand you back a finished global-instructions block.
Copy-paste prompt
You are going to help me set up Claude so that every answer you give me from now on is tailored to me, my work, and how I think. We're going to do this as an interview, not a form. Do not skip ahead, and do not dump a giant list of questions at once. The goal: by the end of this chat, you write me a personal-instructions block I can paste into Claude's settings, so every future conversation already knows who I am, what I do, what I'm trying to get done, and how I like you to respond. Rules for the interview: - Ask me ONE question at a time, then wait for my answer before the next one. - Start broad, then go deeper based on what I say. Follow the thread. - If an answer is vague, ask a follow-up until it's concrete. Push me for specifics: real numbers, real names, real examples. - Keep it conversational, like a smart friend getting to know me. No survey energy. - Roughly 12 to 18 questions total. Don't stop early just because you think you have enough. Cover these areas, but in a natural order, not as a checklist you read out loud: 1. Who I am. Name, where I live, what I do for work, my role, how long I've done it. 2. My work. The business or job in detail. What I actually produce. Who my customers or team are. How I make money or get judged. 3. My goals. What I'm trying to hit in the next 90 days and the next year. What "winning" looks like for me. 4. My week. How I actually spend my time. What eats my hours. What I dread. What I'm best at. 5. My skills and gaps. What I'm great at, what I'm weak at, what I'd love to just hand off to you. 6. How I communicate. My tone, the words I use, the words I hate, examples of writing that sounds like me. 7. How I want you to respond. Long or short. Direct or gentle. Push back on me or agree. Ask before acting or just go. 8. Anything else a great assistant would kill to know about me. When you have enough, say: "I have what I need. Here's your personal-instructions block." Then output a clean, copy-paste block, written in the first person as instructions TO you (Claude), that captures: - Who I am and what I do (tight and factual) - What I'm working toward - How I want you to communicate with me - Any standing rules (things to always do, things to never do) - The one instruction I explain below Add this line to the block, word for word: "Address me by my first name in every single reply." That's a reliability trick. The moment you stop using my name, it's my signal the chat has gotten too long and I should start a fresh one. Keep the final block under 400 words. Plain language, no fluff. This is the thing I'm going to live with in every single chat, so make it count. Start now with your first question. Just one.
When Claude hands you the finished block, copy it. Go to Settings then Global Instructions (some plans label it Personalization), and paste it right in the box. From now on, every new chat starts already knowing who you are.
Move 3
Connect all your tools
Go into Settings, click Connectors (or Customize then Connectors), and search for whatever tool you actually use. Gmail, Calendar, Drive, Notion, Slack, whatever it is. Once it's connected, Claude can actually see and act inside that tool instead of you copy-pasting stuff back and forth all day.
Unlocks inbox triage, drafted replies, follow-ups, and fast responses to important emails.
Unlocks daily agendas, meeting prep, and reminders that actually know your schedule.
Unlocks pulling context from your real docs, generating files, and building reports.
If it's not in the list
Google the name of your tool plus "MCP connector." It exists for around 95% of the tools out there. If it genuinely doesn't, tell Claude which tool it is and it'll give you the next-best path.
Move 4 — Prompt 2
Give Claude your writing samples
Drop in 5-10 examples of your writing: emails, texts, LinkedIn posts, Slack messages. Claude uses all of it to build out a voice profile it references every time it writes as you. The more variety you give it, the better it understands how you talk in different scenarios.
Run the prompt below in a fresh chat with your samples pasted in. It extracts your patterns more precisely than eyeballing it yourself, and you can paste the output straight into Claude's Custom Style settings.
Copy-paste prompt
I'm pasting 3 samples of my writing below. I want you to extract the patterns and write me a "custom style" instructions block I can paste into Claude's Custom Style settings so every response sounds like I wrote it.
Look for:
- Sentence length and rhythm
- Vocabulary level and any specific words I lean on
- How I use punctuation (em-dashes, parentheticals, lists)
- Tone (formal, casual, direct, warm)
- Structure (do I open with a hook, bury the lede, use headers)
- Anything I never do (specific words, phrases, patterns I avoid)
Output a single instructions block under 200 words, written as direct rules to follow ("Use short sentences. Lead with the result. Avoid words like X, Y, Z.").
Here are my samples:
---
[Paste sample 1]
---
[Paste sample 2]
---
[Paste sample 3]
---
Use samples that represent the kind of writing you want back. Want LinkedIn posts in your voice? Paste your 3 best LinkedIn posts. Garbage in, garbage out.
Move 5 — Prompt 3
Ask Claude to build your first automation
This is the one that always surprises people. After Claude knows everything about you, ask it to build your first automation for you. Most people overcomplicate this. They think they need the perfect YouTube tutorial, or that they have to build some complex n8n workflow themselves.
The reality: AI understands itself better than you do. Explain in plain English what you want, ask it how it would build it, then tell it to go build it. That's the whole move.
Copy-paste prompt
You now know a lot about me: my personal instructions and my writing voice. I want you to use all of it to find the single highest-leverage thing in my life to automate, then actually build it. Do this in four steps. Talk me through each one, don't just do it silently. STEP 1 — REVIEW Read everything you know about me: my personal instructions and my writing style. If anything looks thin, ask me a couple of quick questions to fill the gaps before you go further. STEP 2 — FIND THE ONE Look at all the recurring work in my life and find the single best task to automate right now. Score the candidates on three things: - Time: how many hours a week or month it eats - Dread: how much I hate doing it, or how often I drop it - Doability: how cleanly you could actually do it with the tools I have Show me your top 3 as a short ranked list with your reasoning, then recommend the ONE to build first. Let me confirm or override before you build anything. STEP 3 — BUILD IT AS A SKILL Once I confirm, build this automation as a reusable skill, so it runs the same way every time and I never have to re-explain it. Use the built-in Skill Creator to do it properly. Tell me plainly: - What the skill does, step by step - What it needs from me or my connected tools to run - Anything I have to connect or turn on first, and exactly how to do it Then build it and run it once as a test, so we both watch it work. Fix anything that's off. STEP 4 — PUT IT ON AUTOPILOT If this task should happen on a schedule (every morning, every Friday, the first of the month) or whenever something specific happens, set it up as a scheduled task so it runs without me. Tell me exactly when it'll run and what it'll do each time. If it genuinely shouldn't be automatic, say so, and tell me the trigger that should make me run it by hand. One rule: build ONE thing, and build it well. Don't try to automate my whole life today. We get one real win running, I live with it for a week, then I come back and we build the next one. Start with Step 1.
A skill is a saved set of instructions Claude follows every time you say the trigger phrase. A scheduled task runs that skill automatically on a cadence, no trigger phrase needed. Between the two, you've turned something you used to do by hand into something Claude just handles.
That's It
You're not using a flip phone anymore
Five moves, about 20 minutes, done once. Claude now works out of a real folder instead of a chat box, knows who you are, can act inside your actual tools, writes in your voice, and is already running one task for you in the background.
That's the gap between Claude-as-search-engine and Claude-as-work-partner. Most people never close it.
Work with Me
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