How the Hack Works
You have two hours to turn a real work problem into a working agent.
You pick your altitude, pick a scenario, and demo what you made. Coaches are in the room throughout. Aim for something that works and that you understand well enough to keep using, not something polished.
The flow
- Pick your altitude – Cowork with no code, or real code in VS Code.
- Pick a scenario – a real Microsoft work problem to point it at.
- Choose your data path – use your own data privately, or use the provided synthetic pack.
- Build the smallest working version – get to v0.1 fast.
- Test it on a real prompt – see where it breaks.
- Patch the spec – change the rule, sample, or boundary that caused the miss.
- Demo the behavior – show the before, the patch, and the after.
Ground rules
- Nothing sends. Your agent drafts for human review. It does not send email, book meetings, or make commitments on your behalf.
- Keep private data private. If you use your own Microsoft 365 data, keep it on your own screen.
- Build small. A short spec outperforms a long one.
- Use observed behavior. What you actually did last time matters more than what you wish you did.
- Portability matters. Prefer files and formats you can carry across tools.
What "done" looks like
Done means you can run your agent on a fresh prompt and get useful output that reflects the scenario.
For Scenario 1, that means a portable twin spec – soul.md, voice.md, and revealed.md – plus an agent that uses it to draft, decide, or critique in a way that is specific to the person it represents.
What you'll walk out with
You leave with two things:
- A working artifact you can keep improving after the hack.
- A transferable skill: how to compress messy work behavior into a small, testable agent spec.