Have you built your own AI Skills yet?
It doesn't matter if you use ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini or Grok. You gotta start building Skills for your repetitive tasks.
If you're wondering what Skills are... here's how I think about it.
They're like SOP docs (Standard Operating Procedures), where you outline the step by step instructions on how to do certain tasks. It outlines what tools you should use, what training materials you can use for reference and what the criteria is for a task to be considered 'done.'
AI Skills operate in a similar way.
A skill.md file lists the step by step instructions, pre-requisites and/or checklists to get a task done. You can also create 'reference files' that the Skill can use to get more details on the strategy, guidelines and other knowledge info (aka context) to implement the instructions properly.
This is why Skills are great for repetitive tasks that you already have a proven process for.
In fact, some of these AI folks online who claim that they have 50+ AI employees are literally just referring to 50+ AI Skills that they created for 50+ different tasks.
Which brings me to my next point: Skills are more effective if you give them a specific task with clear instructions. It just makes it easier for AI to follow and not get (for lack of a better term) sidetracked with what they're supposed to do.
Now you might be wondering: How do we build these Skills?
There are 2 main ways to do it:
1. Use your AI's Skill Creator Skill. Yup, you read that right. Most AI platforms have a Skill that helps you create Skills. Handy, huh?
2. Build the Skill manually. I used to do this after brainstorming with AI.
Here’s the thing though. Building a Skill is easy. Making sure it works is a totally different ballgame.
If you’re thinking: "Which tasks should I build a Skill on?"
If you already have a proven process for specific tasks, create a Skill for those tasks. You know the steps and you know what good looks like, so you can hand AI your instructions. I suggest you prioritize the one that actually helps you day to day.
If it's something you haven't tried or you're not an expert in, do the process manually first. You can do the entire process manually by yourself or with AI. Really doesn't matter. The goal is to implement the steps in the real world at least a couple of times. Once you've proven it works, you can then ask AI to turn the whole thing into a Skill.
Speaking of Skills, I just released a new video where I walk you through how I built my YouTube Thumbnail Designer Skill.
I'm not a designer. So creating this Skill dramatically speeds up this task for me. And do it waaaaay better than I do.
Let’s build freedom together,
Hazel June
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