Email Triage

The first Skill most people build, because it pays for the whole course in week one. With the Gmail connector on, Claude can read your threads; the Skill tells it how you triage so it does it the same way every time — fast, in your voice, without you re-explaining.

What you’ll build

A reusable Skill that, on the prompt “triage my inbox”, produces:

1. Needs you now — anything blocking someone, time-sensitive, or from a VIP.
2. Reply drafted — Claude writes the reply in your tone; you skim and send.
3. FYI / no action — one line each, so you can archive in a sweep.
4. Unsubscribe / noise — flagged, never drafted.

How to build it

1. Turn on the Gmail connector (Week 3) so Claude can read and draft.
2. Create a Skill folder and a SKILL.md (the instructions Claude loads when relevant).
3. Add a tone-examples.md with 3–4 real replies you’ve sent, so drafts sound like you.
4. Test on today’s inbox, correct one or two drafts, and let the Skill learn your preferences.

The SKILL.md

---
name: email-triage
description: Triage the user's inbox into action buckets and draft replies in their voice.
---

When the user asks to triage their inbox:
1. Pull unread + recent threads from the last 2 days via the Gmail connector.
2. Sort every thread into one of: NEEDS YOU NOW, REPLY DRAFTED, FYI, or NOISE.
   - NEEDS YOU NOW = blocks someone, deadline today/tomorrow, or from a named VIP.
   - NOISE = newsletters, receipts, automated alerts. Never draft replies to these.
3. For REPLY DRAFTED, write a ready-to-send reply matching the tone in tone-examples.md:
   warm, concise, no filler openings ("I hope this finds you well"). Keep under 120 words
   unless the thread needs detail.
4. Output a single 60-second summary: counts per bucket, then NEEDS YOU NOW first.
5. Never send anything. Always leave sending to the user.

Watch-outs

• Keep “never send” in the instructions. Triage drafts, the human sends — that’s the Diligence guardrail.
• VIP list is personal — name real people/domains in the Skill so it doesn’t guess.
• Re-run your tone examples after a month; your voice drifts and so should the Skill.