How I work with Claude — Francisco Lorca

01

Claude is my chief of staff, not my chatbot

1

Knows my world

Briefed once, not every time

Claude has a permanent file with who I am, who I work with, what I'm working on, and how I like things done. It reads it before every conversation.

Context

2

Writes like me

Tone, register, language

Claude has a separate style guide for emails, memos, and presentations — in both English and Spanish. It picks the right one for the task.

Voice

3

Works inside a system

Disciplined, repeatable

Every project has the same shape. Every decision is logged. Rules earn their place by repetition. The system grew by use — not by design up front.

Discipline

A chatbot answers questions. A chief of staff knows the context — and works inside a system.

02

Everything Claude knows about me lives in one place

What lives in this folder

Who I am, what I'm working on, how I like to work.
One sub-folder per project, with the project's journal, decisions, and state.
Style guides for how I write in each format and language.
Templates for memos, briefs, and decision logs.
A research library that grows over time.

Why one folder works

I never explain context twice — Claude reads it before every session.
When I update something once, every future session sees the new version.
If I open my notes app or my laptop, I see the same files Claude does.

One folder, synced via iCloud. Notes, briefs, decisions, voice, rules — all markdown.

03

Three ways to talk to Claude — same memory across all of them

1

Browser chat

Day-to-day work

What most people use — emails, memos, presentations, project work. This is where most of my conversations happen.

Most use

2

Desktop app

Always on, alongside

Same as the browser, but in its own window. I keep it open while I'm working in another app and want Claude alongside.

Alongside

3

Terminal

For code and file work

When I need Claude to edit files or write code on my Mac directly. Same context, more powerful tools — for technical work only.

Developer mode

All three read the same folder, so I pick whichever surface fits the moment.

04

Claude writes and designs in my style — here's how that was built

1

Voice — from my emails

Six style guides

Claude scanned a sample of my real emails, memos, and decks. From the patterns it extracted six rulebooks: email, memo, presentation — each in English and Spanish.

My words

2

Word template — co-built

From samples and structure

I gave Claude McKinsey and Goldman document samples. Together we worked through the Pyramid Principle — governing thought, MECE arguments — and landed on a single Word template I now use for every memo.

My structure

3

Slide templates — co-built

McKinsey, Goldman, Hybrid

Same approach for slides. From the consulting samples I provided, three layouts emerged. I pick the one that fits the audience — board, investor, or peer.

My decks

Voice from my real emails. Templates co-built with Claude from McKinsey + Goldman samples and the Pyramid Principle.

05

Every project has the same shape — Claude knows where to look

Artefact	What it is	Discipline
State file	A short snapshot of where the project is — current status, open items, next priorities.	Slim. Always current.
Project journal	An append-only log of decisions and events, dated. The bitácora.	Never edited. Only added to.
Decisions folder	One file per substantive decision. Context, alternatives, consequences, references.	Frozen once approved.
Outputs	Drafts in current/. Finals in sent/. Replaced versions in superseded/.	State machine on documents.

State + journal + decisions + outputs. Each project, every time.

06

The rules and the trust grow by use, not by design

Patterns earn their place

A new rule starts as a "pattern observed" — a candidate.
It sits there until it shows up three times in real work.
Only then does it get promoted to canon.
Stops the rules file from filling up with rules I'd ignore.
Lives in pattern-candidates.md, with a count next to each.

A short list of trusted actions

Fix a typo. Move a displaced file to _scrap/.
Update a status. Add an entry to a project journal.
Convert a format (e.g. md → docx).
Anything outside this list — Claude asks first. Always.

I don't write rules in advance. They earn their place. Same for what Claude can do without asking.

07

A project keeps its memory between sessions — here's what that looks like

1

Open the project

Day 1, 9:00 AM

I tell Claude: "Compass today." Claude reads the state file (where we are) and the journal (how we got here). Briefed in seconds. No rehash.

Start

2

Do the work

During the session

We draft scenarios, edit the deck, agree the recommendation. Substantive decisions get logged as ADRs — frozen once approved. Sensitive numbers paused for sign-off.

Work

3

Wrap and update

End of session

One word — "wrap." Journal entries written. State file updated. Drafts moved into outputs/current/. Day 7, when I open Compass again, Claude already knows.

Close

Sample case: Project Compass — Q2 board strategy review for a portfolio company.

08

When a session closes, three things happen — at three different speeds

1

Silent

Done without asking

Routine housekeeping: drafts filed in current/, journal entries written, project state updated, memory mirrored to the vault. Things I never want to be asked about.

Automatic

2

Propose

Confirm in chat

Items Claude surfaces in the session log under "Proposed" — promote-to-sent, new ADRs, pattern-candidate updates. I confirm in chat (by number, name, or "all"); Claude applies only those.

By approval

3

Red lines

Hard stop, never silent

Investor, legal, compliance, financial figures, legal terms in deliverables, anything that gets sent or shared externally. Flagged in the session log. I confirm explicitly or it doesn't happen.

Never auto

Wrap-up isn't one button. It's a routing rule. Each item runs on its own track.

09

Two routines run my day, automatically

Morning briefing

Pulls today's calendar from my Mac.
Lists each meeting with prep notes.
Flags people I should LinkedIn-check.
Writes the top of my daily note.
Runs first thing — sets the day's frame.

Post-call digest

Pulls the call transcript from my meeting notes app.
Drafts a summary; I review and add before anything is written.
Files insights into the right project's journal or person note.
Appends to today's daily note for review later.

Both write into a single daily file — top-of-day briefing, then call summaries appended below.

10

What I've built with this system

Category	Examples	How
Live websites	ormeria.com, aristeia-press.com	Cloudflare Pages, deployed from my Mac with one command
Custom skills	Doc drafter, deck builder, design lens, NDA triage, brand voice	Cowork plugins — versioned, shareable
Scheduled automations	Nightly project state update, hourly transcript archive, morning brief, deployment scan	Cron-style tasks running on my Mac
Code projects	Algordian (architecture), Nemo (banking RFP build)	Iterative builds — Claude in the terminal
Documents at scale	Memos, decks, briefs, board papers — bilingual	Same voice, same templates, every time

It's not just decks and memos. The same setup runs websites, skills, automations, and code projects.

11

Four day-to-day jobs Cowork does for me

Use case	What Cowork does	Why it works
Fund AP cycle	Reads each incoming invoice, cross-checks it against the signed contract — rate, scope, dates — flags any mismatch, and once I approve, adds the entry to the fund's ledger.	The contract is the source of truth. Cowork enforces the match every time — no drift between what was agreed and what gets paid.
London property admin	Same pattern, applied to a London property I let. Invoices, council tax, agent fees — each checked against the underlying agreement, then booked to the property ledger.	One discipline, two contexts. The inputs are identical: contract + invoice + ledger.
Websites for close projects	Designed, built, and deployed small sites end to end — ormeria.com, aristeia-press.com, samantha-devin.com. Layout, copy, deploy in one place.	Voice files set the tone. Design-lens shapes the layout. The same toolchain handles design, copy, and deploy.
Career and board work	Treated as its own project. Board-director targeting, conversation prep, bio iterations, follow-ups — with the same state file, journal, decisions, and outputs as any deal project.	Career is just another project. Same shape, same discipline.

Routine, not built-once. Each of these runs week to week.

12

A research library that gets smarter with use

How it works

I drop in an article, report, or book. Claude reads it carefully and turns it into a structured note: what the source claims, the evidence, the open questions, and where it came from.

Each pass also updates the rules for how the next ingest should work — so the library improves itself.

Querying it feels like asking a research analyst who's actually read the source — not skimmed it.

Sources in the library

4

Two strategy reports, one founder interview, and one full book.

Model discipline

Best model

I use Claude's most capable model for ingests — quality matters more than speed.

I add an article or book; Claude turns it into a structured research note I can query later.

13

Claude can reach into my email, calendar, and other apps

Connected app	What Claude can do	How I use it
Email	Read inbox, draft replies in my voice	Daily review, drafting responses
Calendar	See my meetings across all calendars	Morning briefing
Meeting notes app	Pull transcripts after a call	Post-call digest
Cloud drive	Read documents shared with me	Research, due diligence
My Mac files	Read and edit files in my project folder	Notes, drafts, project work
GitHub	Read and commit code, deploy	Websites, code projects

Each connector is a permission I grant once. Claude can read or draft, but I always approve before sending.

14

Hard rules keep it safe

Rule	Why it matters
Never delete files	If something needs to go, it's moved to a holding folder. Recovery is always possible.
Never send anything	Claude drafts emails, messages, and posts. I approve and send. No autopilot.
Always show a plan first	For anything non-trivial, Claude shows me the approach before doing the work.
Match the audience's language	Spanish for Spanish recipients, English for English. Not the language of my prompt.
Stop on sensitive topics	Investor, legal, financial — Claude pauses for explicit confirmation. Always.

Written down once. Read every session. Never softened.

15

The principle: it's a system, not a magic answer — and it grew by use

1

Built in pieces

Small parts, swappable

Each piece does one thing — a style guide, a routine, a template, a project artefact. I can change one without breaking the others.

Structure

2

Grown by use

Earned, not designed

Rules and trusted actions don't get added in advance — they earn their place after they show up three times. The system reflects what I actually do, not what I planned to do.

Emergent

3

I still hold the pen

Drafts, not autopilot

Claude does the heavy lifting. I review every output that matters, approve every send, and freeze every decision. The strongest collaborator I've worked with — and it knows its place.

Trust

The system gets better the more I work in it. The model alone wouldn't.