How to use the M&A Playbook agent skill: install and prompts

What the M&A Playbook skill makes the agent do

Once installed, the agent answers M&A questions using the playbook's framework rather than general knowledge alone. The skill is written from two sides: acquiring a company, and preparing to be acquired.

When you are acquiring, the framework starts with strategic rationale (including buy versus build and what you are really buying: talent, technology or customers), then moves through a due diligence checklist covering financial, technical, legal, people, market and customer domains, then valuation, negotiation and integration. When you are being acquired, it covers readiness signals, preparation steps to take 6-12 months before a sale, and key negotiation terms such as earnouts, lockups and escrow.

• Strategic rationale and buy-versus-build questions
• Due diligence checklist by domain, with red flags
• Valuation approaches and what to verify before using them
• Negotiation points for sellers
• A 100-day post-acquisition integration plan
• Pointers to sibling skills for legal, data and quantitative work

Install the M&A Playbook skill with a ZIP file

Download the ma-playbook ZIP from the skill page on this site. Unzip it so that the skill folder, which contains SKILL.md and a references folder, sits in one of these locations: ~/.claude/skills/ for your personal use across projects, or .claude/skills/ inside a specific project folder if you want it limited to that project.

If you use the Claude apps instead of the file system, open Settings, go to Capabilities, and upload the skill under Skills.

• Personal install: unzip into ~/.claude/skills/
• Project install: unzip into .claude/skills/ in your project folder
• Claude apps: Settings → Capabilities → Skills, then upload

Trigger the skill with natural requests

You do not need a special command. The skill's description tells the agent when to use it, so ask in plain language about acquisitions, preparing for a sale, due diligence, integration planning or deal negotiation. Naming the situation helps the agent pick the right side of the framework.

Be specific about which side you are on. A request such as 'We are a 40-person SaaS company and a strategic buyer has approached us; what should we prepare?' will pull the being-acquired material. A request such as 'Build a due diligence list for acquiring a competitor' will pull the acquiring material.

• "Give me a due diligence checklist for acquiring a small SaaS company."
• "We received an inbound acquisition interest. What should we prepare in the next 6-12 months?"
• "Draft a 100-day integration plan for merging a 30-person team into ours."
• "Which negotiation terms should I watch in an earnout-heavy offer?"

Example: using the skill for a due diligence review

Suppose you are evaluating a target company. Ask the agent to walk through the due diligence checklist by domain. The skill's checklist includes questions such as top-10 customer concentration, churn by cohort, and key IP ownership, with red flags such as more than 30% of revenue coming from one customer or key IP owned by individuals.

Use the output as a working list. The skill notes that not every item applies to every deal, so focus on what matters to your acquisition rationale.

What the skill needs and what it does not do

The skill lists no required tools or dependencies. It does not run scripts and does not use the network. It is a planning guide, not a source of live deal data.

Its valuation ranges are explicitly illustrative. The skill tells the agent to verify market multiples against current sources such as the SaaS Capital Index, Software Equity Group SaaS M&A reports and Aventis Advisors' SaaS valuation multiples, and to cross-check at least two before anchoring a price. For legal terms, data diligence and quantitative models, the skill hands off to sibling skills: general-counsel-advisor, chief-data-officer-advisor and cfo-advisor.

• No listed requirements
• Runs scripts: no
• Uses network: no
• Valuation ranges are illustrative, not current market data

Safety notes before you rely on the output

Because the skill does not run scripts or use the network, it does not fetch or send data on its own. Your main risk is over-trusting the content. Treat the output as a structured starting point and check any figures yourself.

Before any letter of intent or signature, the skill's verification loop asks you to run the LOI or term sheet through general-counsel-advisor and the definitive documents through its contract risk checks, and to send any high-risk finding to outside counsel before signing. Any 🔴 finding goes to outside counsel before signing.

• Verify all market multiples against current external reports
• Send legal findings to outside counsel before signing
• Use advisors for final legal, tax and financial decisions

Tips for getting better results

Give the agent your context: company size, whether you are buyer or seller, stage, and the rationale for the deal. The framework asks you to answer strategic rationale first, so the more you state up front, the more relevant the checklist will be.

Loop findings back into the plan. The skill recommends feeding verification findings into the negotiation-points table before the next counter-offer.

• State your side (buyer or seller) and deal stage in the first message
• Ask for the integration plan by workstream: people, technology, customers, product, operations
• Use the red flags list as a quick screen on both sides