Configure Claude Skills for Quality, Speed, and Cost

Hosted by James Gray

Fri, Apr 3, 2026

3:00 PM UTC (30 minutes)

Virtual (Zoom)

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Claude for Builders
James Gray
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What you'll learn

Set effort levels to control thinking depth per skill

See how effort: high vs. low changes output quality and response time for different skill types

Select the right model for each skill's complexity

Match Opus, Sonnet, or Haiku to your skill based on the reasoning it requires

Test skill quality with evals before deploying

Run structured evaluations to verify your skill performs consistently across scenarios

Why this topic matters

Most Claude skills run on default settings — same model, same effort, same cost regardless of complexity. That's like using the same tool for every job. New frontmatter controls let you configure effort level, model selection, and evaluation per skill — optimizing for quality where it matters and speed where it doesn't. In 30 minutes, see how to configure skills that are smarter, faster, & cheaper

You'll learn from

James Gray

UC Berkeley AI Instructor | Founder | ex CIO & CPO

James Gray accelerates AI adoption globally, drawing on 30+ years leading data and AI teams as CIO, CPO, and engineering executive at enterprises and high-growth startups.

At Microsoft, he architected global data systems powering critical business decisions. He now delivers strategic consulting and hands-on learning experiences that drive results.

His Hands-on AI for Leaders course has trained hundreds of executives. As an instructor for UC Berkeley Haas Exec Ed, James helps leaders design actionable AI roadmaps for immediate implementation—bridging strategy and execution.

James holds a BS in Electrical Engineering from Union College, an MBA from Berkeley Haas, and an MS in Information and Data Science from UC Berkeley. He is a certified leadership coach through Brown University.

Worked at / Students At

Microsoft
UC Berkeley
Google
Databricks

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