IMB Innovation Team · A Practical Guide to Claude Setup
Most people use Claude like a search engine — type a question, get a generic answer, spend the next ten minutes rewriting. The fix isn't a better prompt. It's a system. This course walks you through building one — file by file, lesson by lesson — until Claude works the way you do.
What You'll Build
By the end of this course you'll have a working set of context files that route every task to the right specialized voice — for writing, communications, technical work, presentations, and your specific domain.
A CLAUDE.md file that introduces you to Claude once and routes every future task to the right specialized file. Not a bio — a system.
A CLAUDE_CONTEXT.md that captures what's actually happening right now — projects, relationships, frameworks — with a built-in review date.
A three-file writing system that produces first drafts in your voice, your structure, your phrase bank. No more rewriting AI slop.
A RIPEN-structured prompt library that gets better every time you use it. Your most-repeated tasks, never built from scratch again.
A comms file that handles your internal voice — the sensitive emails, the peer navigation, the board briefings. Different instrument, same values.
An adaptation layer for faith-based leaders — theological framing, stewardship principles, and the human moments Claude must never touch.
The Curriculum
Each lesson links to Don's full article in Notion, distills the key concepts, gives you a concrete assignment with a tangible deliverable, and lets you check it off as you go.
Take-Home Resources
The full 11-part series, "A Practical Guide to Claude Setup" — the primary source for this curriculum.
The official Anthropic docs for Claude Code — the CLI, slash commands, hooks, MCP servers, and Skills.
Don's tool for building RIPEN-structured prompts by answering a few questions. Pairs directly with Lesson 5.
Building Claude into your own tools? Start with the Anthropic API and the official SDKs.
The wider IMB Innovation portfolio — FaithBot, the AI Canvas, and other production tools built on the patterns in this course.
Stuck on a file? Want a second pair of eyes on your CLAUDE.md? Don works directly with IMB staff on this.
Monday Morning Action Plan
Don't leave with inspiration. Leave with an assignment. Each of these is a concrete first step into the curriculum — pick one and do it before Friday.
If you haven't already, install Claude Code, point it at a working folder, and run your first session. Five minutes. Then you can do everything else in this course.
SetupYou don't need a project to start. You need a folder. Then Claude has somewhere to live.
~/work/claude is fine. The path doesn't matter; the habit does.cd ~/work/claude && claude. Confirm you can see the prompt.Pro tip: if your IT environment restricts CLI installs, Claude Code is also available through claude.ai/code in the browser. Start there if you have to.
20 minutes. Lesson 1's assignment. Write down who you are, who you serve, and how you communicate. This single block changes every output Claude gives you from that point forward.
Lesson 1The most common reason Claude outputs feel generic is the simplest: you never introduced yourself. Fix that first.
CLAUDE.md. That's it — the filename is the magic.Time budget: 20 minutes. If you're at 45 and still going, stop — you can refine later. The first version is the one that matters.
Pick the task you do most often and don't love writing each time. Build one structured RIPEN prompt for it. That single entry is the start of a compound-interest prompt library.
Lesson 5RIPEN = Role, Instructions, Parameters, Examples, Notes. Use it as a brief template. Build one. Reuse it forever.
Shortcut: Don built ripen.donbarger.com — answer a few questions, get a structured prompt out.
Ten minutes. Six dimensions. Get an honest read on where your current Claude setup is weak — and a tailored recommendation for which lesson to do next.
DiagnosticThe Skills Assessment is not a quiz. It's a diagnostic — designed to surface the weakest dimension of your current setup so you don't waste time on lessons that aren't your gap.
Open the assessment: assessment.html →
Director of Innovation & AI Strategy · IMB
Don leads AI strategy and innovation at the International Mission Board, where Claude Code is the daily working tool behind FaithBot, the AI Canvas, the document translation engine, and a dozen smaller production tools. He wrote "A Practical Guide to Claude Setup" — the series this course is built on — because most people stop at "Claude is amazing" and never build the system that makes it actually work for their specific job.