How to use the Speaking Opportunities Manager agent skill

What the speaking skill makes the agent do

The skill is written for one person's speaking-opportunity workflow. It tells the agent where the owner's strategy notes, opportunity brief and tracking spreadsheet are kept, and how to search Gmail and Google Calendar for invitations. It also defines how to score each invitation against stated priorities and mark it with a status: accept, strong consider, review or pass.

The agent is also told how to keep the spreadsheet and the per-event notes in sync. Before changing any status it must search for the event, read the full email thread and check the calendar, and it must treat calendar-only holds as unverified unless email supports them.

• Reads the strategy file first, then the opportunity brief
• Scores invitations on audience, role, proof, fit, logistics and risk
• Uses the statuses accept, strong consider, review and pass
• Writes spreadsheet rows in bulk and re-reads them to check the result
• Excludes podcasts, press interviews and generic networking dinners

Install the speaking skill

Download the ZIP file from this page and unzip it. To make the skill available to every project on your machine, place the unzipped folder in ~/.claude/skills/. To limit it to one project, place it in that project's .claude/skills/ folder.

In the Claude apps you can instead upload the skill under Settings → Capabilities → Skills.

• Personal use across projects: ~/.claude/skills/
• Single project: the project's .claude/skills/ folder
• Claude apps: Settings → Capabilities → Skills, then upload

Set up what the skill needs

The skill depends on the gog command-line tool for Gmail, Calendar and Sheets access, and gog must have authentication configured. The skill also expects access to the owner's local folders /Users/steipete/Projects/manager and /Users/steipete/Projects/conferences, and to the referenced Google Sheet and its Invitations tab.

These paths and the sheet are specific to the original owner. If you are not that person, you must change them in SKILL.md before the skill can work for your data.

• gog installed with authentication configured
• Access to /Users/steipete/Projects/manager and /Users/steipete/Projects/conferences (replace with your own paths)
• Access to the Google Sheet 'Peter Steinberger Inbounds' and its Invitations tab (replace with your own sheet)

Trigger the skill with natural requests

The agent loads the skill when your request matches its description, which covers speaking ops, invites, keynotes, panels, Gmail and calendar checks, and conferences. Ask in plain language and name the thing you want checked or updated.

Good requests name a scope and an outcome, for example asking the agent to find recent invitations, check one event before changing its status, or sync the spreadsheet after a change.

• "Find new speaking invitations in Gmail since January and score them."
• "Check whether the summit invite from the organizer is confirmed before we change its status."
• "Update the Invitations sheet with today's status changes and verify the row count."
• "Add a note for the new panel invite using the next opportunity number."

Understand the evaluation and status rules

The skill scores each opportunity by audience leverage, role quality, proof, fit, logistics and risk. A keynote, main stage or fireside ranks above a panel, which ranks above passive attendance. Proof comes from a verified email thread, a named organizer, a calendar invite, a public event page or an agenda.

Statuses mean: accept is committed or clearly worth doing; strong consider is high value but missing details; review is plausible but needs more information; pass is declined, stale, low leverage, a bad fit or explicitly refused.

• accept: committed or clearly worth doing
• strong consider: high value, logistics or details missing
• review: plausible, needs more info
• pass: declined, stale, low leverage, bad fit, or explicitly refused

Run the search commands the skill uses

When gog is available, the skill runs it first for Google data. These are the commands written in SKILL.md, with the search dates and sheet ID it contains. Review them before running, since they read private email and calendar data.

Safety notes before you run it

This skill runs scripts and uses the network. It reads and writes private email, calendar and spreadsheet data. Do not use it in a shared or untrusted environment with confidential invitations, and limit the agent's permissions so it cannot send replies or overreach. The skill is designed for tracking and status updates, not for acting on invitations.

• Runs scripts and uses the network
• Reads and writes private Gmail, Calendar and Sheets data
• Limit agent permissions; do not grant it send rights you do not want used
• Check the sheet and local notes after each run

Tips for getting reliable results

Keep your strategy file current, because the agent reads it first and applies its standing decisions. Give the agent explicit corrections when it misreads an invitation, since the skill says to preserve them. Ask for bulk spreadsheet updates rather than many single-cell edits, as the skill recommends.

• Keep the strategy file (CONFERENCES.md in the original setup) up to date
• State explicit corrections, such as a declined event, so they persist
• Ask for a re-read and row-count check after every sheet update
• Keep per-opportunity notes short and structured as the skill's template shows