How to create a skill

What Is a Skill?

A skill in Roundhouse is a reusable set of instructions that tells Roundhouse how to perform a specific task or workflow. Think of it as a structured "recipe" that captures your firm's process, knowledge and preferred output for a given job, so Roundhouse produces consistent, high-quality results every time.

At its core, a skill is a folder containing a file called SKILL.md    . You build this folder on your own computer, then upload it into Roundhouse through the Skill Centre. Once uploaded, Roundhouse reads the skill's name and description to decide whether it applies to what you're asking. If it does, it reads the full instructions and follows them.

Skills are how you tailor Roundhouse to the way your firm works. Rather than re-explaining a task in every chat, you build the instructions once into a skill, and Roundhouse follows them automatically whenever that skill is triggered.

Why Use Skills?

Skills turn one-off prompts into repeatable, reliable workflows. They're useful when you want to:

• Standardise outputs: Ensure every team member gets the same format, tone and structure (e.g. a consistent client email or workpaper layout).
• Capture firm knowledge: Embed your processes, templates and policies so they're applied consistently.
• Save time: Remove the need to write detailed instructions from scratch each time.
• Reduce errors: Give Roundhouse clear guardrails and required steps to follow.
• Scale best practice: Let your most refined process be used by the whole team, not just the person who created it.

Common examples: drafting client correspondence, preparing a workpaper pack, summarising a document to a set template, or running a recurring compliance checklist.

How a Skill Is Structured

Before you start writing, it helps to understand what a finished skill looks like. A complete skill is a folder on your computer:

your-skill-name/
├── SKILL.md          ← required: the name, description and instructions
├── scripts/          ← optional: reusable code Roundhouse can run
├── references/       ← optional: docs Roundhouse can read when needed
└── assets/           ← optional: templates, fonts, icons, etc.

For most skills, you don't need anything beyond SKILL.md    . The extra folders are only for more complex skills that rely on bundled scripts or large reference documents. When you're ready, you upload the whole folder into the Skill Centre.

Before You Begin

A few things worth having ready before you start:

• A clear task in mind: Skills work best when scoped to a single, well-defined job.
• Any supporting materials: Templates, examples, reference documents or sample outputs you want Roundhouse to follow. These go in the references/     or assets/     folders.
• The right permissions: All users can create their own custom skills and enable or disable them in the Skill Centre. Only users with the Skill Manager role can enable skills across the organisation.

Step 1: Figure Out What You Want the Skill to Do

Before writing anything, get clear on a few things:

What task does this skill handle? Be specific. "Help with documents" is too vague. "Prepare a year-end workpaper pack from a client's financials" is a real skill.

When should it kick in? Think about what someone would actually type to trigger it, for example "prepare the year-end workpapers" or "draft the BAS pack from these Xero exports". These phrases will shape your description.

What should the output look like? A file? A summary in the chat? A particular structure? Knowing this upfront saves revision later.

If you're not sure about edge cases, ask yourself: what would trip this skill up? What inputs might be unusual? Those are worth thinking through before you start writing.

Step 2: Write the SKILL.md

Your skill file lives at your-skill-name/SKILL.md    . It has two parts: a short header, and the instructions.

The Header

At the very top, add a YAML frontmatter block:

---
name: your-skill-name
description: What this skill does and when to use it.
---

The description is the most important part of the whole skill. It's what Roundhouse reads to decide whether to use the skill at all. A weak description means the skill gets ignored; a strong one means it fires reliably.

Tips for a good description:

• Say what the skill does and when to use it.
• Include the kinds of phrases or contexts that should trigger it.
• Be a little pushy. Don't be shy about saying "use this whenever X happens".
• Avoid vague language like "helps with" or "assists in".

Example of a weak description:

Helps with Excel files.

Example of a strong description:

Use this skill whenever the user wants to create, edit, or analyse an Excel spreadsheet, including adding columns, applying formulas, cleaning messy data, building charts, or converting CSV/TSV files into .xlsx format. Trigger even if the user doesn't say "Excel" explicitly, as long as they're working with tabular data they want as a downloadable file.

The Instructions

After the header, write the actual instructions in plain Markdown. This is where you explain what Roundhouse should do step by step.

A few things that make instructions work well:

• Use imperative language. "Read the file", "create a summary tab", "export the summary as a PDF". Direct and clear.
• Explain the why behind rules. Roundhouse follows reasoning better than bare commands. Instead of "ALWAYS include a title row", try "Include a title row so the file is readable when opened directly in Excel without any context."
• Include examples where they help. If there's an expected output format, show it. If there's a naming convention, give a sample.
• Don't over-specify. Leave room for Roundhouse to use judgement on things that don't really matter. Over-constrained skills get brittle.

Keep the SKILL.md     under around 500 lines. If your instructions are getting long, that's a sign to break them into separate reference files (in the references/     folder) that Roundhouse loads only when needed.

Step 3: Upload the Skill to Roundhouse

Once your skill folder is ready and tested, upload it into Roundhouse:

1. Open the Skill Centre from the main navigation.
2. Select +Create Skill.
3. Upload your skill folder (the one containing SKILL.md    ).
4. Confirm the name and description pulled from your SKILL.md     look correct.
5. Choose who can use the skill:
   • Just you: enable it for your own account in the Skill Centre.
   • Across the organisation: a Skill Manager must enable it for the whole firm.
6. Save to make the skill available.

What Roundhouse Reads on Upload

When you upload, Roundhouse picks up the following from your skill folder:

Step 4: Iterate

Almost no skill is perfect on the first draft. After building, run a test, look at what went wrong and revise.

When making changes, think about the pattern, not just the specific failure. If Roundhouse got one output wrong, ask why, and fix the underlying instruction so it would handle similar cases correctly too, not just the exact one you tested.

Common things to improve:

• The description: if the skill didn't trigger when it should have, or triggered when it shouldn't, tweak the description.
• Missing steps: if Roundhouse skipped something, make it more explicit in the instructions.
• Overly rigid rules: if the instructions are causing Roundhouse to do something awkward, loosen them and explain the goal instead.

Run your tests again after each revision. Repeat until the outputs look right.

Step 5: Optimise the Description (Optional)

Once your skill is working well, you can go further and fine-tune the description to make triggering more accurate.

The process involves creating a set of test queries, some that should trigger the skill and some that shouldn't, and checking whether the description correctly sorts them. The most useful test cases are the tricky ones: queries that share keywords with your skill but actually need something different, or queries that are phrased unusually but genuinely do need the skill.

This step matters most for skills that live alongside other similar ones, where there's real risk of the wrong skill firing.

Step 6: Test It

Writing the skill is only half the job. Now you need to check that it actually works.

Come up with 2 to 3 realistic test prompts, the kind of thing a real user would type. Not "test the skill", but something like:

• "Here's the client's financials, can you prepare the year-end workpapers?"
• "Run the new client onboarding checklist for this engagement"
• "Draft the quarterly BAS workpaper pack from these Xero exports"

Run those prompts with the skill available and look at the outputs. Ask yourself:

• Did Roundhouse follow the instructions?
• Is the output what you'd want a user to actually receive?
• Were there any steps that went wrong or got skipped?

This is also a good time to check that the skill triggers when it should, and doesn't trigger when it shouldn't. A skill for preparing BAS workpapers shouldn't fire when someone just asks a general GST question.

Quick Checklist

Before calling a skill done, run through this:

• The description clearly states what the skill does and when to use it.
• The instructions are written in plain, imperative language.
• The why behind important rules is explained, not just the rule itself.
• It's been tested with realistic prompts.
• The outputs look right.
• It triggers when expected and stays quiet when it shouldn't.

Best Practices and Tips

• Keep each skill focused: One skill, one job. Narrow skills are more reliable than broad ones that try to do too much.
• Be specific in your instructions: The clearer and more detailed your guidance, the more consistent the output. Spell out steps, tone and format.
• Use examples: Where possible, include a sample of the ideal output so Roundhouse has a reference point.
• Use plain, direct language: Write instructions as if briefing a capable new team member.
• Test before you share: Always run the skill on a realistic example and refine it before a Skill Manager enables it for the firm.
• Name it clearly: A descriptive name and description make the skill easy to find and use.
• Review and update regularly: As your processes or templates change, revisit your skills to keep them current.

Check out https://agentskills.io/skill-creation/best-practices for further details on building good skills.

Need Help?

If you run into issues or have questions about creating skills, contact support@ai-dojo.com.au.