NOTE: Copy the worksheet using the “Copy page” button above, or open the Google Docs version and make your own copy. Everything on this page is correct as of September 2026.

How to create a Claude skill

A skill teaches Claude how your organisation does a task. Write it once, and Claude applies it every time the task comes up, for everyone who has it: the same steps, the same checks, the same output. It’s the difference between a colleague who asks “how do you want this done?” every time and one who already knows.

This guide is for the people who know the task, not only for developers. For a business process, plain-language instructions and a template or two are enough.

What a Claude skill is

A skill is a folder with one required file, SKILL.md, and three optional sub-folders:

Claude reads the short description of every skill it has, and only opens the rest when a task calls for it. That’s why you can give Claude many skills without cluttering every conversation, and why the description matters most.

Skills follow an open format, the Agent Skills specification, so the same folder works in Claude on the web and desktop, in Claude Code, and in the Claude add-ins for Microsoft 365 apps.

Skill, project or prompt: which you need

If the same prompt is being copied and pasted around a team, it should be a skill.

Choosing the process to turn into a skill

The best first skills share four traits:

• Repeated: weekly or monthly, not once a year
• Done inconsistently: different people get different results
• Rule-based: a good colleague could write down how it should be done
• Output-shaped: it ends in something concrete, such as a document, an email or a decision

If you’re choosing across a whole function, start with the process that moves a number the business reports. Our AI use case prioritisation framework sets out how.

The planning worksheet

Plan the skill before anyone writes it. Fill this in with the people who do the task.

Connectors your organisation has already set up (to email, drives, CRM or other systems) don’t need scripts. Name them in the instructions and Claude uses them.

What goes in SKILL.md

---
name: month-end-commentary
description: Writes month-end variance commentary to the finance team's standard. Use when asked to explain budget variances or draft management accounts commentary.
---

# Month-end variance commentary

## Steps
1. Ask for the management accounts extract if it hasn't been shared.
2. Flag every line more than 10% or £25k from budget (see references/thresholds.md).
3. For each flagged line, state the variance, the cause if known, and the action.
4. Write the commentary using assets/commentary-template.md.

## Decisions
- If the cause isn't known, write "Cause to confirm with [budget holder]"; never guess.

## Before finishing
- Every flagged line has a variance, a cause or a named follow-up, and an action.

The frontmatter. name uses lowercase letters, numbers and hyphens, and matches the folder name. description says what the skill does and when to use it. The open specification allows up to 1,024 characters, but Anthropic’s help centre currently gives 200 for skills uploaded to Claude, so keep it tight.

The body. Steps, decisions, output format and a final check. Keep it under about 500 lines and move detail into references.

References, assets and scripts

• References are what a new colleague would need to read first: the style guide, the thresholds, three examples of good work. Keep each one focused; Claude loads them only when needed.
• Assets are the templates Claude fills in. An asset shows the shape of the output far better than a description of it.
• Scripts are for steps that must be exact every time, such as a calculation or a file conversion. Skip them unless a step has to be exact. Never put passwords or API keys in a script.

A worked example: month-end variance commentary

Building, installing and sharing a skill

1. Build it. Give Claude your completed worksheet and ask it to create the skill. Review the result against your plan; the description and the checks are where it needs your judgement.
2. Package it. A skill is uploaded as a ZIP file with the skill folder at its root (month-end-commentary/SKILL.md, not SKILL.md on its own).
3. Install it for yourself. In Claude, go to Customize > Skills, upload the ZIP file, and enable the skill.
4. Share it. On Team and Enterprise plans, an organization owner can upload the skill in Organization settings > Skills so it automatically becomes available to all users. Admins can also let people share skills with groups.

Menu names change as Claude updates; Anthropic’s help centre has the current steps.

Testing and keeping it current

• Test on three real examples before sharing: one easy, one awkward, one that should make the skill ask a question.
• Watch where it goes wrong, then fix the instructions, not the output.
• Give it an owner. When the process changes, the skill changes.
• Collect good outputs as examples in references/; they improve the skill fastest.

For examples of complete skills, download any of ours from the templates library, such as the AI business case skill.