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Yesterday I showed you what Cowork is.
Today, how to actually brief it.
Because this is where almost everyone goes wrong. They hand an agent a vague wish and get back a confident mess.
The brief is the whole game. Get it right and the thing genuinely finishes your work.
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That's it.
Okay, the brief.
Cowork needs five things. Miss any of them and it starts guessing.
1. The outcome. Name the finished artifact. "A one-page competitor brief saved as a doc," never "research competitors."
2. The materials. Point it at the actual files, folders, and tools. Be specific about where things live.
3. The steps, if order matters. If it has to read A before writing B, say so. Otherwise let it plan.
4. What done looks like. Format, length, where it saves, what it's called.
5. The guardrails. What it must never do. Don't send. Don't delete. Ask first.
Put together, it looks like this:
Outcome: [the finished artifact. Exactly what I want to exist at the end.]
Materials: [the folder, the files, the tools. Where everything lives.]
Steps: [only if order matters. Otherwise: plan this yourself and show me the plan first.]
Done looks like: [format, length, filename, where it saves.]
Guardrails: don't send, publish, or delete anything. Ask me before any action that leaves this workspace.
When you're finished, tell me what you did and flag anything that looked wrong or ambiguous.That guardrail line is not optional. Set it once and you'll never get a nasty surprise.
One more move makes a huge difference.
Ask for the plan first.
Add this: "Before you start, show me your plan in 5 bullet points and wait for my go."
Now you see the shape of what it's about to do, and you can correct it before it spends an hour walking the wrong way.
A good first job: real, but low stakes.
Take that folder of notes you've been meaning to organize. Ask for a summary doc. Watch it work. Review it hard.
Then hand it something bigger.
Briefing well is the skill. It's the same skill for every agent and every model. It's also what most of Claude Mastery is really teaching.
The full setup, step by step, no tech background needed.
Quick one.
What job are you nervous to hand over? Reply, and I'll tell you if it's a good first one.
Talk soon,
Zephyr
