Claude Projects and Skills explained (and how to use them well)

What is a Claude Project?

A Project is a shared workspace that gives Claude knowledge and instructions for a particular team or piece of work. You add documents, such as your service descriptions, pricing rules, templates and examples, plus custom instructions about how Claude should work. Every conversation in the Project starts with that context.¹

Good uses for Projects include:

• a sales Project with your services, case studies and proposal templates
• a client Project with background, previous work and brand guidelines
• an operations Project with your procedures and policies
• a team handbook that answers common internal questions

What is a Claude Skill?

A Skill packages a repeatable way of doing a specific task, with instructions and resources, so Claude follows your process whenever that task comes up. Where a Project says 'here is what you need to know about this team', a Skill says 'here is exactly how we do this job'.²³

Typical Skills include writing a proposal in your format, producing a weekly report, reviewing a document against a checklist or applying your brand guidelines.

Projects or Skills: which do you need?

• Use a Project when a team needs shared knowledge and context for ongoing work.
• Use a Skill when a specific task should be done the same way every time.
• Use both together for the best results: the Project supplies the knowledge, the Skill supplies the method.

How to build a Project that works

1. Curate, do not dump. A handful of accurate, current documents beats a folder of everything.
2. Write clear instructions: who the work is for, the tone to use and what good looks like.
3. Include two or three examples of excellent finished work.
4. Test it on real tasks and refine the instructions based on what comes back.
5. Give someone ownership for keeping it up to date.

How to write a good Skill

1. Give each Skill one job. 'Write a proposal' is a Skill; 'do sales' is not.
2. Write the steps the way you would brief a capable new starter.
3. Include the template or format, and an example of the finished output.
4. State the checks: what must be true before the work is ready.
5. Test it against several real examples, including awkward ones.

Where connectors fit in

Connectors let Claude reach the tools where your live information sits, such as email, files or your CRM. Projects and Skills tell Claude how to work; connectors give it access to the current facts. Together, they are what makes Claude genuinely useful day to day.⁴