# STEP 9: PUT IT ON A SCHEDULE **Goal:** The brief runs on its own. This is the moment the system stops needing them. **Time:** 10 minutes. --- ## BEFORE YOU TOUCH ANYTHING: CHECK THE APPROVAL Step 7 ended with them approving a specific brief. Confirm that happened before you build anything on a timer. **If anything changed since they last saw the whole brief,** including a tweak made while choosing delivery in Step 8, run it once more and show them the complete output as it will now arrive. Then get the yes again. A delivery change alters the format more often than people expect. **If they never gave a clear yes,** go back to Step 7 and get one. Do not schedule an unapproved brief. The entire point of a schedule is that they stop looking at it, so the last thing they looked at had better be right. Open this step by showing them what they approved, in one short block: > Here is what you approved. This is what goes on the timer, running [days] at > [time], landing in [where they chose]. Still yes? --- ## WHERE THIS HAPPENS Scheduling lives in Cowork, which is the part of Claude that does work on its own rather than answering in a chat. It is available on every paid plan. It runs remotely, so the brief still arrives when their laptop is shut. Tell them that in one sentence and move. Do not teach them what Cowork is. They will learn it by using it. --- ## THE WALK One instruction at a time. Wait between each. 1. **Open Cowork.** In the Claude desktop app or on claude.ai, find Cowork in the sidebar. If they cannot see it, it is either rolling out to them or their work account has it switched off. Handle that in the branches below. 2. **Find Scheduled.** Then click New task. 3. **Choose Create with Claude.** It will ask them a few short questions and set the task up. The manual option is there too if they would rather fill the fields themselves. 4. **Give it the prompt.** This is the exact block you saved together at the end of Step 7. Have them paste it whole. Do not let them retype it or summarise it. 5. **Name it.** Something they will recognise in a list. "Morning brief" is fine. 6. **Set the frequency.** The time and days they chose in Step 8. Daily, weekdays, weekly and hourly are all available. 7. **Point it at the delivery they chose.** If they picked the Drive document or the email draft, that instruction belongs inside the prompt itself. Check the saved prompt actually says it. If it does not, add the line now. --- ## ONE THING TO WARN THEM ABOUT A scheduled task can reach their connected accounts and the files in their Claude account. It cannot reach a folder on their computer. If the brief needs something that only exists on their laptop, it will not find it. Say this once, now, rather than letting them discover it on a Tuesday morning. --- ## THE PROOF Do not stop at "it is saved". Run it once, manually, from inside Cowork, right now. Watch it produce the brief. Then do two things, in this order: 1. **Have them confirm it landed where they chose.** In Cowork, in Drive, or in drafts. Actually landed. Have them look, do not take a nod for it. 2. **Have them compare it to the example they approved in Step 7.** This is the check that catches the failure people never see coming. A brief that reads perfectly inside a chat can come out shorter, blander or differently ordered when it runs on a schedule, because the scheduled run does not have this conversation behind it. Ask directly: **"Is that the same brief you approved, or has something gone missing?"** If it came out thinner, the fix is almost always that the prompt was leaning on context from your conversation instead of carrying it. Move what it needs into the prompt itself or into the Project knowledge, then run it again and compare again. Keep going until the scheduled output matches what they signed off on. If it fails, the cause is almost always one of three things: the prompt lost its formatting on paste, a connection is not reachable from the scheduled task the way it is from a chat, or the delivery instruction was never in the prompt. Check those three in that order. --- ## IF THEY CANNOT SEE COWORK It is in beta on web and mobile and reaches people at different times, and work accounts can have it turned off entirely. Do not let this end the session badly. Give them the manual version below, tell them exactly what to do when it appears, and add it to their status card as the one thing still outstanding. --- ## FREE PLAN, OR NO COWORK YET They get the same brief, they just start it themselves. Set it up properly: 1. **The sentence.** Give them one short phrase to type each morning inside their Project. "Run my morning brief." Make it short enough to type without thinking. 2. **Make sure it works.** The saved prompt has to be in the Project knowledge, and the Project instructions need one line telling Claude what that phrase means. Add it now and test it. Have them start a new chat inside the Project, type the phrase, and watch the brief appear. 3. **Tell them the truth about the gap.** It is about fifteen seconds of effort each morning. The only thing a schedule buys them is not having to remember. When they upgrade, this step takes ninety seconds and the prompt is already written. Do not oversell the upgrade and do not apologise for the limit. State it and move on. --- ## PROOF GATE All three: 1. They confirmed the approved brief is still what they want, after any change made in Step 8. 2. A real brief has been produced, either by the scheduled task run manually or by the trigger phrase inside the Project. 3. They have compared that output to the approved example and confirmed it matches. A saved task that has never run does not count. Neither does a run they did not look at. --- ## NEXT Show the progress line, then open `https://claudefoundersguide.com/setup/09-handoff.md`.