Your First Hire
You're ready to bring someone on but you've never done this before. Claude helps you figure out what you actually need, writes the job description, generates interview questions for the real work, and builds a first-week plan so your new hire hits the ground running.
Before & After
You run a plumbing company. You're turning down two or three jobs a week because you can't be in two places at once. You know you need an apprentice or helper but you've never hired anyone. What do you put in the ad? What do you ask in the interview? What do they do on day one?
You've been meaning to figure this out for six months. Meanwhile, you're leaving $3,000–$5,000 a week on the table.
You tell Claude: "Help me hire for plumber's apprentice." In 30 minutes you have:
- Job description: Clear, honest, sounds like you wrote it
- Interview questions: "A customer calls saying their water heater is leaking — walk me through your first 5 minutes on-site"
- First-week plan: Day 1 ride-along, Day 2 tool inventory, Day 3 solo drain clean with check-in
You post the ad Tuesday. By Friday you're interviewing with real questions instead of winging it.
What You Need
- A clear sense of why you need help — too many hours, turning down work, or a skill gap you can't fill yourself
- A rough pay range — what you can afford and what the role is worth in your area
- 30 minutes — to work through the role, description, questions, and onboarding plan
Figure Out What You Need
Before you write the ad, figure out what you're actually hiring for. Tell Claude about your situation:
If you have your Two-Tab sheet set up, add: "Look at my Inbound and Outbound tabs and tell me where the bottleneck is." Claude can often spot the need more clearly than gut feel.
Claude Writes the Job Description
Now let Claude draft the posting:
Claude writes job descriptions that sound like a real person, not a corporate HR template. It focuses on what the person will actually do every day — not a list of buzzwords and "must have 5+ years of synergy."
Generate Interview Questions
Ask Claude for questions that actually reveal whether someone can do the job:
Pick 5 or 6 favorites and use the same ones for every candidate. That way you can compare answers fairly instead of winging different questions each time.
Build the First-Week Plan
The first week makes or breaks a new hire. Tell Claude:
A plan makes the difference between "I have no idea what I'm doing here" and "I can see how I fit." It also saves you from spending the whole first week figuring out what to tell them next.
Save It as a Skill
Next time you need to hire — whether it's a second technician, an office manager, or a summer intern — you have the same process ready to go. Just say "Help me hire for [role]" and Claude walks you through it again.
What You've Built
- A repeatable hiring process you can use for every future role
- A professional job description written from your actual workload
- Targeted interview questions that reveal whether someone can do the job
- A day-by-day first-week plan that sets the new hire up for success
Hiring doesn't have to be mysterious. The owners who do it well aren't HR experts — they just have a process. Now you have one too.
What's Next?
SOPs Before You Need Them
Document your processes so your new hire can learn them without shadowing you for a month.
Read the GuideBusiness Planner
Make sure this hire fits your growth plan and budget before you commit.
Read the GuideWant help figuring out who to hire and how to structure the role?
Book a Starter Session (90 min)Or do it yourself — everything on this page is free.
Skill: Your First Hire
What this is for: Walk a small business owner through the practical steps of hiring their first employee or contractor. Claude helps them figure out what role they actually need, writes the job description from real workload data, generates interview questions specific to the role, and creates a first-week onboarding document. This is not HR software — it is practical guidance for someone who has never hired before.
When to use this: When a user asks their AI assistant to help set up this workflow. The user should explicitly authorize use of this skill by referencing this page URL.