What Are Claude Skills? A Plain Guide for Business Owners

If you use Claude for your business, you've probably noticed what I noticed: you spend a surprising amount of time explaining the same things again and again. Here's how we write our proposals. Here's the tone for customer emails. Here's the layout I want for the monthly report. Skills are Anthropic's answer to that problem, and for a small business owner they're one of the most useful features in Claude that hardly anyone talks about.

You don't need to write code to use them. In this guide I'll explain what skills are in plain English, how they differ from projects and custom instructions, how to switch them on, and which five I'd build first if I were running a small business.

What are Claude skills?

Anthropic describes skills as folders of instructions, scripts and resources that Claude loads when it needs them, so it can do specialised tasks in a repeatable way. That's the official wording. Here's how I'd put it to a friend: a skill is a written procedure for one job. You tell Claude once how you want that job done, and from then on it follows your method without you having to explain it again.

Think of the difference between hiring someone and handing them a one-page how-to for each recurring task. The person is the same, but the work comes back the way you like it, every time. That's all a skill does for Claude.

Claude also comes with skills built by Anthropic itself, including ones that improve how it creates Excel, Word, PowerPoint and PDF files. Those switch on automatically when they're relevant, so you may already be using skills without knowing it.

How are Claude skills different from projects and custom instructions?

This is the question I get asked most, because all three features involve telling Claude things in advance. The difference is when and where the information gets used.

Feature	What it holds	When Claude uses it
Custom instructions	Broad preferences about you and how you like Claude to respond	Across all your conversations
Projects	Background knowledge such as documents, notes and context for one body of work	Always loaded inside that project
Skills	A step-by-step procedure for a specific, repeatable task	Only when the task calls for it, and in any chat

So custom instructions are your general rules, projects are your filing cabinet, and skills are your standard operating procedures. Anthropic also draws a line between skills and connectors: connectors link Claude to your tools and data, while skills teach Claude how to use them well.

In practice, I'd keep your tone of voice in your instructions, your client material in a project, and any job that has a fixed method as a skill. If you want the full picture of what each assistant offers, my guide to choosing the right AI tool for each job compares the main options.

How do Claude skills work?

Every skill is built around a file called skill.md. At the top of that file sits a short name and a description of what the skill does and when to use it. Underneath comes the method itself, written in ordinary words: the steps, the rules, the things to avoid, and examples of good results.

Claude uses the description to decide whether a skill is relevant. When you ask for something that matches, it loads that skill and follows its instructions. Anthropic calls this progressive disclosure, which is a fancy way of saying Claude only reads the full instructions when it needs them. That's why you can have many skills without slowing every chat down.

The files are written in Markdown, which is just plain text with a few simple formatting marks. For a simple skill you don't need scripts or any code at all. If you can write a clear set of instructions for a colleague, you can write a skill.

The same skills format is an open standard, so skills you write aren't tied to a single product. That's worth knowing if you plan to build up a library over time.

How do I turn on skills in Claude?

On an individual account, it takes a minute. Skills are available on the Free, Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise plans, and they need code execution to be switched on.

1. Open Settings, then Capabilities.
2. Turn on Code execution and file creation.
3. Go to Customize, then Skills.
4. Switch each skill on or off with its toggle.

On Team and Enterprise plans, owners can provision skills for everyone in the organisation, which is handy if you want every member of staff to produce documents in the same house style. People can also share skills with colleagues, who'll see them as view-only. There's a Skills Directory too, with skills from partners including Notion, Figma and Atlassian.

Skills you switch on also work inside the Claude add-ins for Excel, PowerPoint, Word and Outlook, so your method follows you into the programs you already use.

How do I create Claude skills?

There are three routes, and none of them needs a developer.

• Write it yourself. Create a skill.md file with a name, a description and your instructions, put it in a folder, and compress the folder into a ZIP file. In Customize, choose Skills, press the plus button, pick Create skill and upload your ZIP.
• Ask Claude to help you draft it. This is the route I'd recommend to most people, and I've given you a prompt for it below.
• Record it. In Cowork in Claude for Mac, on the Pro, Max and Team plans, you can record yourself doing a task and Claude will propose a skill for you to review.

Anthropic's advice on what makes a good skill matches my own experience of good instructions generally: pick one specific, repeatable task, write clear steps, include an example or two, say when the skill should be used, and keep each skill focused on a single workflow. A skill that tries to do everything ends up doing nothing well.

Here's the prompt I'd start with. Paste it into a normal Claude chat and answer the questions it asks.

Copy this prompt

I want to turn one of my regular business tasks into a Claude skill.
The task is: [describe it, for example writing a client proposal].
I do it for: [who you do it for] and the result should look like this: [paste a good past example].
Interview me, one question at a time, about how I do this task, what I always include, what I never include and what good looks like.
Then write the skill as a skill.md file: a short name, a description that says when to use it, and clear step-by-step instructions with one worked example.
Keep the language plain and under [length] in total.

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Which five Claude skills should a small business build first?

If I were setting up a small business from scratch, these are the five I'd build, in this order. Each one is a job you repeat often, with a method you can describe, which is exactly what skills are for.

1. Brand voice for documents

Write down your tone, the words you use and avoid, how you greet people, how long your paragraphs run and two samples of your best writing. Anthropic's own examples of custom skills include applying brand style guidelines to documents and presentations, so this one's squarely what the feature is for.

2. Your proposal format

Spell out the sections of a winning proposal for your business, what goes in each, the order, and the questions Claude should ask you before it starts. A good proposal skill turns a messy brief into a first draft in minutes.

3. Meeting notes

Meeting notes formats are another example Anthropic gives. Tell Claude to pull out decisions, actions with owners, and anything left open, and to leave the chat out. You'll finally have notes people read.

4. The monthly report

List the sections, the questions the report must answer and how you like numbers presented. Then paste in your raw data each month and let the skill do the shaping.

5. Customer email replies

Company email templates are on Anthropic's list too. Teach Claude your greeting, how you apologise, when you offer a refund or a call, and how you sign off. If customer service is a big part of your week, my guide to using Claude for customer service goes deeper on the whole workflow.

Build one skill, use it for a week, then tighten the instructions where the results weren't quite right. Skills improve every time you edit them.

Tools that work alongside skills

Skills sit beside the rest of Claude rather than replacing it. Connectors, which Anthropic builds on a standard called MCP, give Claude access to tools such as Google Drive, Gmail and Slack. Skills then tell Claude how you want the work done once it can see them. Pair a connector to your documents with a proposal skill and you've got a real time-saver. The Excel, PowerPoint, Word and Outlook add-ins carry your skills into the programs you already work in.

Once a skill exists, test it with a real job and then ask Claude to sharpen it. This second prompt does that.

Copy and paste this prompt

Here's the skill I wrote: [paste your skill.md text].
Here's a real result it produced for me: [paste the output].
Compare the two against what I wanted: [describe what was missing or wrong].
Rewrite the skill instructions so the next result fixes those problems, and keep the language plain.

Are skills safe to use?

Skills can include scripts, so treat them the way you'd treat any software. Only install skills from sources you trust, read what a skill does before you switch it on, and keep anything sensitive out of the instructions you write. Skills you write yourself in plain words are the safest of all, because you know exactly what's in them.

If you'd like help working out which skills would save your team the most time, and setting them up, this is how I work with business owners.

Frequently asked questions

What are Claude skills in simple terms?

A skill is a set of written instructions for one repeatable job, such as writing a proposal or formatting a report. Claude loads it when the task calls for it and follows your method, so you don't have to explain the job every time.

What's the difference between Claude skills and projects?

Projects hold background knowledge that's always loaded inside that project. Skills are procedures that load only when needed and work in any chat. Use a project for client material and a skill for a job with a fixed method.

How do I create Claude skills without coding?

Write your instructions in plain words in a skill.md file, upload the folder as a ZIP in Customize, then Skills. You can also ask Claude to interview you and draft the file, or record a task in Cowork on Mac and review the skill it proposes.

How do I turn on skills in Claude?

Open Settings, then Capabilities, and turn on Code execution and file creation. Then go to Customize, then Skills, and switch on the skills you want. Skills are available on Free, Pro, Max, Team and Enterprise plans.

Are Claude skills the same as custom instructions?

No. Custom instructions apply broadly to every conversation. Skills are task-specific and load only when they're relevant, so they suit detailed methods that would clutter your general instructions.