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Strategic Reading

Reads a book, article, or transcript through one strategic problem you face and produces an applied playbook.

Source Download skill
Repository
garrytan/gbrain
Stars
31,447
Licence
MIT
Files
1 file

What it does

When you give the agent a long source such as a book, article, transcript, or case study plus a specific problem you're facing, it reads the source with that problem in mind. It maps the source's central ideas onto your situation, lists what to do, avoid, and watch for, and gives short, medium, and long-term recommendations with direct quotes. The result is saved as a page in a personal knowledge base (the skill's 'brain') rather than a general summary.

Great for

  • Someone facing a specific strategic fight, negotiation, or competitive situation who wants lessons from a book or case study applied to it
  • Professionals who want actionable takeaways from a source tied to a current decision rather than a general overview
  • Users who already keep a gbrain-style knowledge base and want the output filed under concepts/ or projects/

Skip it if

  • General book summaries: the skill explicitly says it is not for these, and a different skill is better
  • Fresh facts or current news about a topic: it works only on the text you supply, so it cannot verify up-to-date information
  • Academic literary analysis: the skill deliberately ignores literary merit and focuses only on strategic application

Try asking

  • “Read this book through the lens of my standoff with our largest client and give me a short, medium, and long-term playbook.”
  • “Apply this case study to my problem of convincing an incumbent regulator to change a rule.”
  • “What can I learn from this transcript about handling a hostile board member?”
  • “Extract a playbook from this article for my plan to enter a crowded market.”
Step-by-step guide: how to use Strategic ReadingInstall, first run, examples, tips and FAQs

Install in 3 steps

  1. 1

    Download the skill

    The ZIP contains the 1 original files, the MIT licence and an attribution note.

    strategic-reading.zip
  2. 2

    Add it to your agent

    Claude Code (all projects)

    mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills && unzip strategic-reading.zip -d ~/.claude/skills/

    Claude Code / Agent SDK (this project only)

    mkdir -p .claude/skills && unzip strategic-reading.zip -d .claude/skills/

    Claude apps (web/desktop): Settings → Capabilities → Skills → Upload skill, and choose the ZIP.

  3. 3

    Ask for the task

    No special command needed — the agent reads the skill's description and loads it when your request matches. Try one of the prompts above.

Get better results

  • Describe your strategic problem concretely (who the opponents are, what you have tried, what the deadline is) so the mapping is specific rather than generic.
  • Provide the full text or clearly marked chapters; the skill triages chapters and reads only high-relevance ones in depth, so you may want to name the sections that matter.
  • Check every quote and chapter citation against the original source, since the skill is instructed to quote directly and reviewers should verify accuracy.

What's inside

  • SKILL.md

Redistributed unmodified from garrytan/gbrain under the MIT licence. The assessment was drafted with AI from the skill's files on 2026-10-29. Skills can instruct your agent to run code — read SKILL.md and any scripts before installing.