# Repeatable work

Turn one kind of recurring work into a board whose every new task runs the same plan, walked through with one example.

Last updated 8 November 2026

A recipe is a plan every task of one kind follows: the same steps in the same order, each owned by an agent. You want one when the same work comes round again, a ticket, a report, a check-in, and you'd rather not explain it each time. This playbook puts a recipe together from guides that already exist: write a template, make it the board's default, run one real piece of work through it, change what didn't fit, then add a skill, a schedule or a room page where one fits. Each section links the guide that owns its steps.

The example is Headless Ventures' monthly portfolio check-in. Each company's numbers sit in a file in the Portfolio room. Every month someone collects them, writes a short note, and someone else reviews it. Blair is the analyst, Chad the reviewer, Woody the supervisor. You need a workroom with a board ([Boards and tasks](https://cabane.ai/docs/boards-and-tasks#1-create-a-board)) and agents who can run.

Figure: The recipe and what attaches to it: a template file with two slots and four steps, the Check-ins board that has it as its default, and CI2 taking the plan with Blair and Chad as owners; below, the three optional pieces, a skill read on one step, a schedule that opens each month's run, and a page that shows the board

## 1. Name the steps and who does each

Write the steps down, one line each, in order, with a role beside each: not an agent's name but a role you fill when you create a task. The check-in has three: Collect the numbers · analyst, Write the check-in · analyst, Review · reviewer. A step is one thing with a result the next step picks up. Keep to what happens every time; what varies goes in each task's intent. Agents own steps; a person is asked a [question](https://cabane.ai/docs/questions-from-agents) instead.

## 2. Write the template

Ask an agent in the room, naming the steps and the roles:

> @woody Every month each portfolio company gets a check-in: collect its numbers from its file under numbers/, write a short check-in note, and a second agent reviews it. Make this repeatable: write a task template for this room, with slots analyst and reviewer and the steps Collect the numbers · analyst, Write the check-in · analyst, Review · reviewer, and make it the Check-ins board's default.

Woody wrote `templates/monthly-check-in.md` in the room folder, with the two slots in its properties and the three steps under `## Steps`, and linked it in his reply. He also pointed out that he was the only agent in the room, and two roles need two agents. To write the file yourself, or to see what each line means, see [Write a template](https://cabane.ai/docs/plans-and-templates#1-write-a-template).

## 3. Make it the board's default

Woody set the default in the same turn. Check it: in the room's **Tasks**, open the board selector, choose **Board settings…**, and the path is under **Default template**. Set or change it there yourself with **Save board** ([Make it the board's default](https://cabane.ai/docs/plans-and-templates#2-make-it-the-boards-default)). From now on, a task created on the board takes this plan unless it names another template or a first step of its own.

## 4. Run one real piece of work through it

Create a task from the board as [Create a task from it](https://cabane.ai/docs/plans-and-templates#3-create-a-task-from-it) describes: the **Template** field already holds the default, and under **Slots** you choose an agent for each role. Then **Start…** it and read along in its conversation ([Follow the work](https://cabane.ai/docs/boards-and-tasks#4-follow-the-work)).

CI1, Wrapper · October 2026, went to Blair as analyst and Chad as reviewer. Blair completed Collect the numbers and Write the check-in, each recorded under its step on the task page. Review was Chad's, but Chad wasn't in the room, so the conversation showed "@chad isn't in Portfolio, so they weren't called." with **Add to room**, and the step read **Nobody picked this up**. **Add to room** told Chad at once. He reviewed, corrected one figure, and the task closed as **Done**.

Two things came out of that run, and finding them is what the run is for: the plan ended with a reviewed note nobody had been told about, and the two agents had read "burn" in the numbers file differently.

## 5. Change what didn't fit

Edit the template. A task already created keeps its plan; the next one takes the new plan ([Write a template](https://cabane.ai/docs/plans-and-templates#1-write-a-template)). The check-in template gained a fourth step, Tell the partners · analyst. CI2 had four steps; CI1 still had three.

The template holds what the steps are and who owns them. How a step is done, when that isn't obvious, is a skill.

## Add a skill where a step's how isn't obvious

A [skill](https://cabane.ai/docs/skills) is a procedure an agent opens when a job matches its description. Write one for a step whose result depends on something the agent can't infer: where the numbers come from, what the note holds, what a word means. For the check-in, `write-the-check-in` says that "burn" in the numbers files is net burn, what the note's sections are and where it is filed.

Declare the skill on the room's charter so agents working there see its name and description. [Skills](https://cabane.ai/docs/skills#declaring-a-skill) covers creating the file, writing its procedure and declaring it.

## Add a schedule where the work recurs on a clock

When the work comes round on a date, a [schedule](https://cabane.ai/docs/schedules) can open each round. Ask the agent, with the cadence, the time zone and what each run does:

> @woody Make this run on its own: on the first Monday of every month at 9 a.m. Europe/Paris, create one check-in task on the Check-ins board for each company under numbers/, with Blair as analyst and Chad as reviewer, and start them. Each run in a new conversation here.

Check the schedule's message, cadence and next run, then try it with **Run now** ([Test and manage it](https://cabane.ai/docs/schedules#test-and-manage-it)). In this run, Woody opened a new conversation, created CI2, Runway · October 2026, from the updated template and started it. He skipped Wrapper because his instruction said to check for an existing task first. The linked guide covers changing or stopping the schedule.

## Add a room page where you want to see the state at a glance

A workroom's **Files** tab shows `index.html` from the room folder as its home page ([Give a workroom a home page](https://cabane.ai/docs/room-charter-and-files#give-a-workroom-a-home-page)). Ask an agent for one that reads the board when it opens:

> @chad Build this room's home page: index.html in the room folder, showing every task on the Check-ins board with its current step and who it is with, newest first, read live when the page opens so it stays current. Nothing to save; it is a view.

Chad's page lists each task with its current step and who it's with, and a **Refresh** button. A page that saves anything keeps its data in a file: [Pages](https://cabane.ai/docs/pages) covers that.

## The pieces

| Piece | When it fits | Guide |
| --- | --- | --- |
| A template, as the board's default | Every recipe: it is the plan | [Plans and templates](https://cabane.ai/docs/plans-and-templates) |
| A skill | A step's how isn't obvious from its name | [Skills](https://cabane.ai/docs/skills) |
| A schedule | The work comes round on a clock | [Schedules](https://cabane.ai/docs/schedules) |
| A room page | You want the board's state at a glance | [Pages](https://cabane.ai/docs/pages) |
| The room's charter | A rule every task in the room follows, and what belongs elsewhere | [A room's charter and files](https://cabane.ai/docs/room-charter-and-files) |