Blog · No. 06 · Show & tell
What Claude actually said.
I've spent five posts telling you what Claude can do. This week I thought I'd just show you. Three things I actually used Claude for this week, with the exact words I typed and exactly what came back. No tidying up. No cherry-picking.
1. A school email I'd been sitting on for a week
My son's school sent a letter about a change to the pick-up procedure. I disagreed with it. I'd been meaning to reply for days but kept putting it off because I wanted to be clear without sounding like That Parent.
Here's a draft:
Dear Mrs Hargreaves,
Thank you for your letter about the change to afternoon pick-up times. I appreciate you letting us know.
I wanted to flag that the move from 3:15 to 3:30, effective next Monday, is quite difficult for our family. I work fixed hours and had arranged childcare around the current time. A week's notice doesn't leave much room to adjust.
Could you let me know whether there was a parent consultation on this, or whether one is planned? I'd welcome the chance to feed in before the change becomes permanent. I imagine other working parents may be in a similar position.
Happy to chat in person if that's easier.
Best wishes,
Myk Masuku
That's what came back. I changed one word ("flag" to "raise"), added a line about my wife's schedule, and sent it. The whole thing took under two minutes. It had been sitting in my head for a week.
2. Making sense of a confusing insurance renewal
My car insurance renewal came through, and the letter was four pages of small print with a price that seemed higher than last year but I couldn't work out why. I took a photo of it on my phone, opened the Claude app, and typed this:
Your renewal premium is £487.20, up from £412.60 last year. That's a £74.60 increase (about 18%).
Here's what changed:
Excess: Your voluntary excess has gone from £150 to £250. This actually should lower your premium, so something else is pushing it up.
Mileage: They've estimated you at 10,000 miles this year vs. 8,000 last year. If your mileage hasn't changed, correcting this could bring the price down.
Cover level: Still fully comprehensive, no change there.
No claims: You still have 5+ years no claims, fully protected. That's good.
The most likely reason for the increase is the higher mileage estimate. I'd ring them and confirm your actual mileage. If it's still around 8,000, you could save £40-60.
I would have stared at that letter for twenty minutes and still missed the mileage thing. Claude found it in seconds. I rang the insurer, corrected the mileage, and saved £52.
3. Thinking through whether to say yes to something
A friend asked me to be a school governor. I was flattered but not sure I had the time. Instead of going round in circles in my head for three days (which is what I usually do), I opened Claude.
Good questions to ask before you commit:
Time: Most governing boards meet 6-8 times a year, usually in the evening, for about 2 hours. But there are also committee meetings, reading packs before each meeting (which can be 30-50 pages), and occasional school visits. Realistically, it's 4-6 hours a month, more at the start while you're learning.
Term length: Governor terms are usually 4 years. That's a meaningful commitment. Ask if there's a probation period or a way to step down gracefully if it doesn't work.
What they actually need: Governing boards need a mix of skills. Ask your friend what gap they think you'd fill. If it's finance or strategy, your business background is directly useful. If it's general support, you might be less engaged.
Meeting times: Ask when meetings are held. If they're at 6pm and you do school pick-up and bedtime, that's a tight window.
Your honest capacity: You're already working, parenting, and volunteering. That's a full life. The question isn't whether this is interesting, it's whether you'd do it well without resenting it by month three.
One thought: you could ask to attend one meeting as an observer before deciding. Most boards allow this.
I didn't know governor terms were four years. I didn't know I could ask to observe a meeting first. Those two things alone changed how I thought about it. I ended up saying yes, but only after I'd asked the right questions, which I wouldn't have known to ask without this conversation.
What I want you to notice
Three different tasks. An email, a document, a decision. In each case, I just told Claude what was going on in normal words. No special formatting, no clever prompt tricks. I talked to it like I'd talk to a helpful friend, and it talked back the same way.
The total time for all three: about two minutes. The total time I would have spent without Claude: conservatively, an hour and a half. That's the gap. Not because Claude is magic, but because it removes the blank-page problem. You're no longer starting from nothing. You're reacting to something, and reacting is always easier than creating.
If you've been reading these posts and thinking "sure, but what does it actually look like?" -- now you know. It looks like this. It's not flashy. It's just useful.