Get Real Work Done with Claude

What you’ll learn

Start using Claude for everyday work: draft and refine an email, summarize uploaded files, build editable documents with artifacts, and keep a project organized with files and instructions.

Key steps

1. 1

   Sign in and learn the main screen.

   Open claude.ai and create a free account. The prompt box in the middle is where you type requests; the sidebar on the left starts new chats and holds your recent conversations so you can return to earlier work.

2. 2

   Draft a message, then refine it.

   Ask for a first draft, such as a professional email to a supplier. If the result assumes something wrong, do not start over — reply with the correction, a shorter length, a different tone, or more context about the recipient. This back-and-forth is how you get the best results. Fill in the placeholders, then copy the message or open it in your email app.

3. 3

   Upload a file and ask questions about it.

   Click the plus icon or drag a file into the chat — documents, PDFs, and spreadsheets all work. Ask for a summary and key takeaways, then follow up with specific questions instead of reading the whole document yourself.

4. 4

   Create an artifact you can edit.

   From the sidebar's more menu, open artifacts and choose a type, such as documents and templates. Describe what you need — the example builds a product launch plan. Review the outline it proposes before it builds. The result opens in a separate workspace you can edit: ask in chat to tighten the whole document, or highlight one section and use improve to rewrite just that part.

5. 5

   Organize related work in a project.

   Rename your artifact and add it to a project, or create a new project from the sidebar. Drag reference files into the project knowledge, then add instructions — for example, 'always respond in bullet points' — so you stop repeating yourself. Questions asked inside the project pull from everything you added.

6. 6

   Connect tools and save reusable skills when ready.

   From the plus icon you can add connectors to services like email, files, and calendar — review the access requested first, and skip this until you need it. Skills let you save reusable instructions or workflows, such as your own way of writing emails, so you do not retype them.