AI Guides › Workbench
By Nigel Guy · 9 min read
Most people use an AI assistant at work as a faster way to be busy. They paste in a to-do list, ask for "a productivity plan", get a tidy schedule and then follow it for about a morning. It feels like progress because the output looks organised, but nothing in it was checked against what your week actually contains.
The rule: give Claude your real calendar, tasks and constraints, make it ask for what is missing, and have it return something you can act on today rather than advice about productivity.
This kit is five prompts that follow the order of a working day: audit the week, rank the work, shrink the task that keeps slipping, protect a focus block, and debrief. None of them will make you "finish in four hours what takes everyone else a day". That claim is theatre. What they do is remove a few specific kinds of waste, and each one produces a short, concrete output.
| Prompt | What it does | Cost | Best for | Catch |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Meeting audit | Sorts last week's meetings into keep, shorten, convert or decline | Works on Claude's free plan | Calendars that fill up by default | Only as honest as the meeting list you give it |
| 2. Impact sort | Ranks tasks by consequence and deadline | Free plan | Monday planning | It cannot know your boss's priorities unless you say |
| 3. Slipping-task shrinker | Turns a stuck task into a first action under 15 minutes | Free plan | Tasks that keep moving to tomorrow | A vague task gives a vague answer |
| 4. Focus block designer | Builds one protected block with a stop rule | Free plan | Deep work around a busy calendar | Cannot move your meetings for you |
| 5. End-of-day debrief | Captures what happened and sets tomorrow's first task | Free plan | A five-minute close | Skipped on bad days, which is when it matters |
On cost: at time of writing Anthropic lists Claude Free at $0, Pro at $20 a month billed monthly ($17 a month if you pay $200 up front for the year) and Max from $100 a month. That is roughly £15 and £75 respectively at time of writing, but Anthropic's pricing page showed USD only when checked, so confirm the £ price, including any VAT, at checkout. Usage limits apply on every plan and reset on a rolling five-hour window; Pro also has a weekly limit. None of these prompts needs a paid plan, because each is short. You can check your own usage under Settings > Usage.
Each one follows the same skeleton, which is the part worth copying for your own prompts. It gives Claude a role and context, a goal with a description of a good result, ordered steps, an output format, guardrails, an instruction to ask rather than guess, and a short self-check. Anthropic's own prompting guidance covers the same ground: be clear and direct, give context, structure the request and say what format you want. Fill in every [SQUARE_BRACKET] placeholder before sending. If you leave one blank, the prompt tells Claude to ask you.
Use this once a week, on the previous week's meetings. Fill in your role, a list of meetings with duration and attendee count, and what you were actually responsible for that week. Do not paste notes containing other people's private information.
You are an experienced chief of staff helping me, a [YOUR_ROLE], review how I spent last week's meeting time.
Goal: decide which recurring or one-off meetings earned their place, so I can free up time next week without damaging my work or my relationships.
My meetings (title, length, number of attendees, my role in it, and what came out of it):
[MEETING_LIST]
What I was accountable for last week:
[MY_OUTCOMES]
Steps:
1. If any meeting is missing its length, attendee count or outcome, ask me about it before judging it. Do not guess.
2. For each meeting, decide one of: KEEP, SHORTEN, CONVERT TO WRITTEN UPDATE, or DECLINE. Base the decision on whether a decision was made or my input changed something.
3. Total the hours released if I act on your recommendations.
Output: a table with columns Meeting, Verdict, One-line reason, Hours released. Under it, give me two sentences I could send to the organiser of the weakest meeting, polite and specific, proposing the change.
Constraints: do not recommend declining anything my line manager or a client chairs without flagging the risk. Do not invent attendees or outcomes.
Before you answer, check that every meeting has a verdict and the hours add up.
Fill in your task list, deadlines, who is waiting on each item, and your top goal for the week.
You are a pragmatic operations lead. I am a [YOUR_ROLE] and I need to decide what to do first this week.
My goal for the week: [WEEKLY_GOAL]
My tasks, each with deadline, who depends on it, and rough time needed:
[TASK_LIST]
Fixed commitments I cannot move: [FIXED_COMMITMENTS]
Steps:
1. Ask me for any missing deadline, dependency or time estimate. Do not assume them.
2. Score each task from 1 to 3 on consequence if it slips, and from 1 to 3 on how soon that consequence lands.
3. Sort into: DO FIRST, SCHEDULE, DELEGATE OR SHRINK, DROP.
4. Name the single task that would most advance my weekly goal.
Output: a four-section list, each task on one line with its two scores and a six-word reason. Finish with a short note on any task you could not classify and why.
Constraints: no more than three tasks in DO FIRST. If more than three seem urgent, tell me which assumption to challenge. Do not add tasks I did not list.
Before answering, check that every task appears exactly once.
Fill in the task, how many times it has moved, and what you suspect is stopping you.
You are a calm coach who is good at breaking down work that feels bigger than it is.
The task I keep postponing: [TASK]
It has slipped [NUMBER] times. What I think is in the way: [BLOCKER_OR_NOT_SURE]
Who or what it is for, and when it is genuinely due: [AUDIENCE_AND_DEADLINE]
Goal: find the smallest useful first action I can finish in 15 minutes, and say what I should do about the real blocker.
Steps:
1. Ask up to three short questions if the task is unclear. Wait for my answers.
2. Classify the blocker: unclear outcome, missing information, waiting on someone, too large, or I just dislike it.
3. Propose a first action that starts with a verb and has a visible finish.
4. If the task is not worth doing, say so and suggest how to decline or renegotiate it.
Output: blocker type, first action, a two-line message to send if I am waiting on someone, and what "done for today" looks like.
Constraints: no motivational talk. Do not rewrite the whole task into a project plan.
Before answering, check that the first action could really be done in 15 minutes.
Fill in your free windows, the task, your interruption sources and the date.
You are a scheduling assistant who protects deep work realistically.
Date: [DATE]
Windows in my calendar that are free: [FREE_WINDOWS]
The one piece of work that needs focus: [FOCUS_TASK]
What usually interrupts me: [INTERRUPTIONS]
Hard stop or next commitment: [HARD_STOP]
Goal: design one focus block I can actually keep, with an exit plan for interruptions.
Steps:
1. Ask which window I would pick if you do not have enough information.
2. Choose a start and end time, including a five-minute set-up and a five-minute wrap-up.
3. Write the block's single stated outcome in one sentence.
4. For each interruption I listed, give one concrete response, such as a status setting, a holding reply or a parking note.
5. Set a stop rule: what I do if I am not done when the block ends.
Output: the block as a calendar entry (title, time, outcome), then a numbered interruption plan, then the stop rule.
Constraints: one block only. Do not fill the rest of my day. Do not assume I can cancel meetings.
Before answering, check the block fits inside a free window and ends before my hard stop.
Paste rough notes, even a few fragments, of what happened today.
You are a straightforward colleague helping me close my working day in five minutes.
My notes from today (messy is fine): [TODAY_NOTES]
What I planned to do: [TODAY_PLAN]
Tomorrow's known commitments: [TOMORROW_COMMITMENTS]
Steps:
1. Ask me if the notes do not tell you whether a planned task was finished.
2. List what was finished, what was started, and what did not happen.
3. For each unfinished item, say whether to carry it, shrink it or drop it.
4. Pick tomorrow's first task, which should be doable within the first hour.
5. Note one thing that cost me time today that I could change.
Output: three short lists, then "Tomorrow, first:" with one line, then one line on the time drain.
Constraints: do not invent work I did not mention. Keep the whole reply under 150 words.
Before answering, check that tomorrow's first task does not clash with a stated commitment.
If you only have time for one, run the meeting audit, since a calendar is where the most time is usually decided for you. Run the impact sort on Monday, the focus designer when the sort gives you a clear DO FIRST item, the shrinker only for the task that has moved more than twice, and the debrief at the end of any day you want to start cleanly. Keep the five in one note so you can paste them without rewriting.