2/5 Your First Skill in 10 Minutes: Meeting Summary

· 6 min read
#Claude Code #skills #tutorial #AI #ai-augmented-workflow

Previous: Claude Code Isn’t for Developers

Post 1 explained what skills are. Now you build one.

The task: take messy, rambling meeting notes and produce a clean summary with attendees, decisions, action items, and deadlines. By the end of this post, you’ll have a reusable skill that does this every time.

Step 1: Create the Project Folder

Create this structure anywhere on your computer:

meeting-tools/
├── .claude/
│   └── skills/
│       └── summarize-meeting.md    ← the skill
├── sample-notes.txt                ← test data
└── output/                         ← results go here

The .claude/skills/ folder is where Claude Code looks for skills. Any .md file in there becomes available automatically.

Step 2: Write the Skill

Create .claude/skills/summarize-meeting.md:

# Meeting Summary

## Purpose
Transform messy, informal meeting notes into a structured summary document.

## Input
A text file containing raw meeting notes — informal language,
scattered topics, incomplete sentences.

## Instructions
1. Read the input file carefully
2. Extract all attendees mentioned by name
3. Identify key decisions that were made (not just discussed)
4. List every action item with:
   - Owner (who is responsible)
   - Task description
   - Deadline (if mentioned)
5. Note the next meeting date if mentioned
6. Ignore off-topic items (broken equipment, social chatter)

## Output Format
Create a Markdown file with these sections:

### Header
Meeting title and date

### Attendees
Bullet list of names

### Key Decisions
Numbered list of decisions made

### Action Items
Table with columns: Owner | Task | Deadline

### Next Meeting
Date and any notes

## Rules
- ONLY use information from the input file — never invent details
- If a deadline is not specified, write "Not specified" in the table
- Keep language concise and professional
- Bold any deadlines that are within 7 days

That’s the complete skill. 30 lines of plain text instructions.

Step 3: Create Sample Input

Save this as sample-notes.txt — real-world messy notes with financial details, scattered action items, and off-topic comments:

budget review march 3 with cfo + finance team

petra started with Q4 numbers -- revenue up 8% but costs
also up 12% so margins actually dropped. martin not happy.

long discussion about the contractor situation. we spent
45k on contractors in Q4 which is way over budget. sarah
says some of that was unavoidable because of the CRM
migration delays.

martin wants a new approval process for contractors --
anything over 5k needs his sign-off. jakub pushed back
saying that slows things down too much. compromise:
anything over 10k needs CFO approval, under 10k needs
department head approval.

action: petra to create new contractor approval form by mar 10
action: sarah to retroactively document all Q4 contractor spend
action: martin to present updated budget to board by mar 15
action: jakub to get three quotes for the new server infrastructure

petra also flagged that two invoices from datacorp don't match
the PO amounts -- one is 340 EUR over, the other 125 EUR under.
needs investigation. sarah will call datacorp.

next steps: reconvene in two weeks to review contractor spend
under new approval process

oh and the coffee machine in the 3rd floor kitchen is leaking
again. jakub will submit a maintenance ticket.

Step 4: Run It

Open VS Code. Open the meeting-tools folder. Launch Claude Code and type:

Use the meeting summary skill to summarize sample-notes.txt

Claude reads the skill instructions, reads the notes, and produces something like:

# Meeting Summary — Budget Review, March 3

## Attendees
- Petra (Finance)
- Martin (CFO)
- Sarah
- Jakub

## Key Decisions
1. New contractor approval process:
   - Over 10,000 EUR requires CFO approval
   - Under 10,000 EUR requires department head approval
2. Datacorp invoice discrepancies to be investigated

## Action Items

| Owner | Task | Deadline |
|-------|------|----------|
| Petra | Create new contractor approval form | **Mar 10** |
| Sarah | Document all Q4 contractor spend | Not specified |
| Martin | Present updated budget to board | **Mar 15** |
| Jakub | Get three quotes for server infrastructure | Not specified |
| Sarah | Call Datacorp re: invoice discrepancies | Not specified |

## Next Meeting
Two weeks from March 3 (approx. March 17) — review contractor
spend under new approval process

Notice what happened:

  • The coffee machine was ignored (off-topic, per the rules)
  • Deadlines within 7 days are bolded
  • The compromise decision was captured accurately
  • Invoice discrepancies were flagged as an action item

Step 5: Refine

The first version is never the final version. Edit the skill to improve it:

Add an executive summary:

### Executive Summary
Write 2-3 sentences capturing the most important outcome of the meeting.

Add a priority column:

### Action Items
Table with columns: Priority | Owner | Task | Deadline
- Priority based on: financial impact, explicit urgency, deadline proximity

Flag items without deadlines:

- If a deadline is not specified, write "⚠️ No deadline" to make it visible

Run it again. Compare the output. Keep what works, adjust what doesn’t. This is the cycle:

graph LR A["Write skill"] --> B["Run on sample data"] B --> C["Review output"] C --> D["Edit skill"] D --> B

What You Just Built

A reusable workflow. Next Monday when you come out of a meeting with scribbled notes, you drop them in a file, run the skill, and get a structured summary in seconds. Every time. Same format. Same quality.

The skill file is 30 lines of text. It took 10 minutes to write. It saves 15-20 minutes per meeting. And it gets better every time you refine it.

The Pattern

Every skill follows the same structure:

Purpose → Input → Instructions → Output Format → Rules

The meeting summary is one example. The same pattern works for:

  • Extracting key points from long emails
  • Turning rough notes into formatted reports
  • Comparing two documents for discrepancies
  • Creating weekly status updates from daily logs

Next post takes this pattern to a real business problem: account reconciliation — matching invoices to receipts and flagging discrepancies automatically.

Next: Skills That Solve Real Problems: Account Reconciliation

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