How to teach Claude a desktop app with Record a skill, step by step
- Open Record a skill. In the Claude Cowork app, click the plus button in the message box and choose Record a skill.
- Start recording. Click Start recording. A small window appears showing that Claude is capturing your steps and your audio.
- Do the task once and narrate it. Work through the task in your desktop program the normal way, saying each step out loud. In the demo that was creating a commercial client, adding an insurer and policy number, and generating an ACORD 125.
- Click Done. When the task is finished, click Done. Claude processes the recording: it transcribes what you said and reviews the screenshots of where you clicked and what you typed.
- Review and save the skill. Claude turns the recording into a skill proposal that describes the steps. Read it over and click Save.
- Run it with a slash command. Type / in a new message, pick the skill, and add the details for this run, such as the client name. Allow Claude access to the app when it asks, then let it work.
Claude can work inside programs on your computer
The video opens with Ben's hands off the keyboard and mouse while Claude fills out an Adobe Acrobat signature request. Ben asked it to open the document and add a name, date, and signature field so the form could be sent to someone. Claude placed the fields and then stopped, because Ben had told it not to send e-signature requests on his behalf. Its final message said to either tell it to send, or click send yourself.
That same ability works for any program installed on your computer. Plenty of agency software runs as a desktop app instead of in a web browser like Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge. HawkSoft, the agency management system, is a good example. Claude can learn to use programs like that too.
Why you show Claude the task first
You could tell Claude to open a program and figure it out. Ben compares that to sending someone into a neighborhood to pick up a stereo without an address. They would probably find it eventually, but they would keep stopping and looking around along the way.
Recording a skill is giving Claude the address and directions. You show it the task once, and from then on it follows the same path much faster. A skill is a small automation, a set of instructions Claude keeps and reuses.
Recording the skill in a HawkSoft-style app
HawkSoft only runs on Windows and Ben is on a Mac, so the demo uses OwlSoft, a stand-in built for the video with similar features: contacts, prospects, and ACORD 125 generation. Ben clicked the plus button in Claude Cowork, chose Record a skill, and clicked Start recording.
Claude listens through the microphone while you work, so Ben narrated every step. He created a new commercial client called Bob Jones Shoe Store, filled in the contact name, the owner title, phone, email, and website, and saved the client. Then he opened Forms, generated an ACORD 125 to check it, added an insurer called Demo Insure with policy number 123456, and generated the ACORD 125 again to confirm both appeared.
After clicking Done, Claude showed what it had captured. It transcribed the narration and took screenshots showing exactly where Ben clicked, how he dragged the window, and what he typed. It then wrote up a skill proposal to create a sample commercial client in OwlSoft and generate an ACORD 125. Ben clicked Save.
Running the skill hands off
To run it, Ben typed a slash, picked the OwlSoft ACORD 125 demo skill, and asked for a sample client named Michael Jordan with a made-up business. Claude asked permission to use the OwlSoft app, Ben allowed it, and Claude went to work in the background while the mouse stayed free.
Claude created Michael Jordan under a business it named Airborne Sports Performance LLC, opened Forms, and generated the ACORD 125. When the first form came out without an insurer, it followed the recorded steps, added Demo Insure with policy 123456, and generated the form again. Opening OwlSoft afterward showed the new commercial client with all its details in place.
It is not the fastest thing in the world, and Ben says so. The value is that you can hand Claude a task on your computer and go take a call, sit in a meeting, have lunch, or grab a coffee while it works. You could record the same kind of skill with HawkSoft on a PC today.