Knowledge and jobs
Skills
A skill is a written procedure Piste follows for a recurring task. The owner writes skills on the Skills page and approves any skill that Piste proposes.
A skill is a procedure your workspace has written down for a recurring task, such as building the Monday sales recap or answering a wholesale enquiry. It has a name, a line saying when to use it, and the steps. When a task matches a switched-on skill, Piste loads it and follows it, in anyone's conversation and in automation runs, so you explain how you like something done once.
Where do I find skills?
Open Skills in the small links at the foot of the sidebar, with Connections, Apps, Memory and Activity (app.usepiste.com/settings/skills). The page lists Your skills, and each row shows who wrote it ("Written by the agent" or "Written by you"), with buttons to edit or delete it and a switch to use it or not.
Only the workspace owner can add, edit, switch or delete skills. A playbook's own skills come with the playbook and aren't listed here.
How do I write a skill?
Press New skill
On Skills, press New skill. The dialog asks you to write it like you'd brief a teammate.
Name it
Under Name, give it a short name, such as "Weekly sales recap". Automations find a skill by its name.
Say when to use it
Under When should the agent use it?, describe the task that should trigger it, such as "Building Monday's sales recap, or when asked how last week went". Piste reads this line to decide whether to load the skill.
Write the steps
Under What should it do?, write the procedure in plain words or Markdown: which numbers, in what order, what to compare them with, and what finished work looks like.
Press Add skill
The skill is saved switched on, and Piste can use it from your next message.
To change a skill, press its edit button and then Save changes. To stop Piste using one without losing it, turn off its switch. To delete one, press its delete button and confirm. A deleted skill can't be brought back.
Can Piste write a skill for me?
Yes. Ask Piste in a conversation to turn what you've just worked out into a skill, or Piste may offer to when you've settled a procedure you'll want again. Piste checks your existing skills first, so it updates one of its own rather than adding a near-duplicate.
Each new or changed skill waits for the owner's approval before it's saved, and only the owner can approve it, even in a Slack thread someone else started. Piste saves a skill only when the owner is the one asking, and an automation run can't write one. A skill Piste wrote shows "Written by the agent". Piste can later change only the skills it wrote and you haven't edited since. Once you edit one, it shows "Written by you" and is yours.
How does an automation use a skill?
Name the skill in the automation's instructions, for example "Follow the weekly-sales-recap skill". A run loads skills like any conversation. If you rename a skill, update every automation that names it, since Piste finds a skill by its name.
What makes a good skill?
A good skill is a procedure, not a fact. Write it for someone who hasn't seen your earlier conversations:
- Name the task, not the topic: "Weekly sales recap", "Wholesale enquiry reply".
- When should the agent use it? says what triggers it, in the words people use when they ask.
- What should it do? lists the steps in order, says what to compare with, and describes what done looks like, such as a length or a format.
- Keep it to a page or two. Put facts that change, like a supplier's lead time, in memory instead.
- Never put passwords, tokens or payment details in a skill.
Here's an example:
Name: Weekly sales recap
When should the agent use it?
Building Monday's sales recap, or when asked how last week went.
What should it do?
1. Compare last week's net sales, orders and average order value
with the week before, Monday to Sunday.
2. List the five best-selling products by net sales, with units sold.
3. Name any of those five with less than two weeks of stock left.
4. Open with one sentence: up or down, and by how much.
5. Keep the whole recap under 150 words.Other skills merchants write:
| Skill | When to use it | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Wholesale enquiry reply | When someone asks how to answer a wholesale or trade enquiry | Lists what to ask the buyer, your trade terms, and the tone to use. |
| New product check | When a product is about to go live | Checks the listing's images, description, price and stock against your house standard. |
| Returns review | When asked why returns are up | Says which products and reasons to look at first, and how to present them. |
Limits
| Field | Limit |
|---|---|
| Name | 64 characters, with at least one letter from A to Z or a number |
| When should the agent use it? | 1,024 characters |
| What should it do? | 20,000 characters |
| Names | Each skill needs its own: two names that read the same, such as "Weekly Recap" and "weekly-recap", can't both be used |
| Files | None: a skill is text only |
Related
- Memory: facts and preferences, rather than procedures.
- Playbooks: a whole method, with its own skills and routines, in one install.
- Automations: runs that can follow a skill by name.
- Approvals: how the owner approves a skill Piste proposes.