The Right Way to Onboard Claude Cowork

Presented by Zapier: https://zapier.com/

Get the skills we showed: https://thenextnewthing.ai/corey-cowork-setup
Guest link: https://www.linkedin.com/in/coreyganim/

Most people are using Claude Co-Work wrong—and getting maybe 10% of its actual value.

In this episode of The Next New Thing, Andrew Warner sits down with Corey Ganim to fix that.

Instead of treating Claude like a chatbot, Corey shows how to turn it into a true agent by properly onboarding it—giving it context about you, your business, your tools, and how you work.

He shares a simple skill that walks you through the entire setup in about 15 minutes, creating the exact files most people skip: your brand voice, working style, personal context, and system instructions.

The difference is dramatic.

Without onboarding, AI outputs sound generic.
With it, everything—from LinkedIn posts to workflows—starts to feel like it was written by you.

This episode is a step-by-step look at how to actually unlock Claude Co-Work, not just use it.

⏱ Timestamps
00:00 Why most people get only 10% from Claude Co-Work
00:18 The missing onboarding step
00:45 What the onboarding skill does
01:12 Why generic AI output happens
01:57 Creating a brand voice skill
02:33 Before vs after (LinkedIn example)
03:00 Installing and running the onboarding skill
04:03 Speed-running the full setup
05:06 Connecting tools for context
06:00 How Claude learns from your data
07:03 Building your brand voice automatically
08:06 Choosing how Claude works with you
09:00 Creating core context files (MD files)
10:03 Using transcripts and content as reference
11:06 What each file does (brand, style, instructions)
12:00 Improving outputs with better context
13:12 Running the same task after onboarding
14:06 Why results improve dramatically
15:00 Turning Claude into a real agent

👉 Join us: https://thenextnewthing.ai/