# Use your Claude well

*The AI Myth · a gift from webinar four*

## 1. Ask Claude how to ask it

Before you ask for the answer, ask Claude to help you understand how to ask the question better, because a better question gets you a better answer every time.

**Try:** "I want to figure out whether to hire my first salesperson, but I'm not sure I'm asking the right question. Help me ask it better first."

## 2. Question the approach first

Stop working IN the task. Start working ON it.

Step back one more level and ask whether this is even the right move, because the most expensive work in any business is good work aimed at the wrong approach.

**Try:** "Before we write this post, is a post even the right way to reach the people I want?"

## 3. Brief it like a sharp new hire

Claude is brilliant but knows nothing about how your business runs, so explain the job the way you would to a capable person on their first day.

**Try:** "Here is who my customers are, what we sell, and what a good result looks like for this task."

## 4. Tell it why, not just what

When you explain the reason behind a request, Claude understands your goal and gives you a more useful answer.

**Try:** "Keep this short, because my clients read it on their phones between appointments."

## 5. Show it one good example

One example of what you like teaches Claude your tone and format faster than a paragraph of description.

**Try:** "Here is an email I wrote that got great replies. Write the next one in the same style."

## 6. Paste the document, then ask

When you are working from a long document, put the document first and your question after it.

**Try:** "[paste the contract] Now, what in this contract should worry a small business owner?"

## 7. Ask who the best minds are

Asking who the best thinkers on a subject are, and how they would structure it, is a tool you can use at any level, not a level of its own.

**Try:** "Who are the most respected thinkers on customer service, and how would each of them approach my problem?"

## 8. Break big jobs into pieces

Split a big goal into smaller parts, solve each one, then put them back together with care, because the parts depend on each other, the same way lasagna is assembled before it is cooked.

**Try:** "Break my new client onboarding into its parts, and show me which parts depend on each other."

## 9. Let it say "I don't know"

Tell Claude plainly that it is fine to say it is unsure, so it does not fill the gap with a confident guess.

**Try:** "If you're not sure about something, say so instead of guessing."

## 10. Ask what it missed

After any answer, ask Claude to audit its own work, which you can do at any level and on any task.

**Try:** "What is weak about this? What did you miss? What am I getting wrong?"

## 11. Save what works

When something works, keep it: save it in a Project so you never start from scratch, carry it everywhere as a Skill, then feed it your own private material, your Vault.

**Try:** "Turn what we just figured out into instructions I can save in my Project."

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From our AI Myth lesson canon, and Anthropic's published prompting guidance (platform.claude.com, prompting best practices).