An agent can reach your records and still need directions for the job. Anthropic’s December explainer separates those two pieces: MCP connects tools and data, while skills describe how to use them in a particular workflow.
The article uses meeting preparation as an example. A connection lets the agent retrieve pages from a workspace. A skill tells it which pages matter and how to assemble the documents. The same idea applies when a team has a process it wants others to follow.
Our takeaway is to write down the decisions that you’d explain to a new colleague. Name the record to trust, the exception that changes the next step, and the point where someone must approve the work. Don’t leave those details for the agent to infer.
So check the instructions against a few completed jobs, including one that went wrong. We’d ask the person who does the work to review the result and explain any misses. That gives you a concrete reason to change the instructions.
Anthropic. Original article published December 19, 2025. Commentary added September 28, 2026.
