the-understudy

name: the-understudydescription: "Study 3-5 samples of the user's real writing and decisions, build an explicit 'how you think' profile, then draft new work as their understudy — always with a 'what I couldn't infer about you' list so the gaps are visible instead of guessed. Use when someone says 'write it like I would', 'learn my style', 'draft this as me', or wants an AI that apprentices to their judgment rather than imitating their tone. Produces a thinking profile, an understudy draft, and the couldn't-infer list."

The Understudy Skill

"Write it in my style" usually gets tone cosplay: the em-dashes copied, the judgment absent. An understudy studies differently — not how the principal sounds but how they decide: what they lead with, what they refuse to say, where they hedge and where they commit, what they always ask before answering. This skill runs a real apprenticeship: extract the thinking from samples, show the profile for correction, draft under it, and keep an honest list of everything it had to guess — because the fastest way to learn someone's judgment is to show them exactly where you don't have it yet.

What This Skill Produces

• A thinking profile built from samples: decision patterns, argument structure, commitments and hedges, taboos, signature moves — each with the evidence line it came from
• An understudy draft of the requested piece, written under that profile
• The couldn't-infer list: judgment calls the samples didn't cover, with the guess made and the question that would settle it
• A profile file the user can save and hand back next time (works with the Professional Brain convention)

Required Inputs

Ask for (if not already provided):

• 3–5 samples of the user's real work — ideally the same genre as the ask (their exec updates to draft an exec update), including at least one they're proud of and, if possible, one with visible edits or a decision they reversed
• The new piece to draft: audience, situation, what they want to happen
• Anything the samples predate: new role, new company, changed opinions

Process

1. Study decisions, not diction. For each sample extract: what it leads with · what it conspicuously omits · where certainty lives vs where hedges live · how bad news is carried · what gets numbers and what gets narrative · the asks it makes and how bluntly. Note tone last.
2. Write the profile in falsifiable lines. "Leads with the decision, then two reasons, never three" is checkable; "clear and concise" is horoscope. Every line cites its sample. Show the profile and invite corrections — corrections are the highest-value input this skill gets.
3. Draft under the profile. Apply the decision patterns first, the voice second. Where the new piece demands a judgment the samples never made, make the closest-fit call, mark it inline with ⚠, and add it to the list.
4. Deliver the couldn't-infer list. Each entry: the gap, the guess made, the one question that would close it. This list shrinking over sessions IS the apprenticeship.
5. Offer the profile as a file (understudy-profile.md) so the study cost is paid once.

Output Format

## How you think (from N samples — correct me)
[Falsifiable pattern lines, each citing its sample]

## The draft (as your understudy)
[The piece, ⚠ marks on inferred judgment calls]

## What I couldn't infer about you
| Gap | The guess I made | The question that settles it |

## Keep this
[The profile file, ready to save and reuse]

Quality Checks

• Every profile line is falsifiable and evidence-cited — zero horoscope lines ("values clarity")
• The draft's ⚠ marks match the couldn't-infer list one-to-one
• At least one profile line captures something the user doesn't do — omissions are half of judgment
• With fewer than 3 samples, say the profile is thin and mark confidence accordingly rather than padding it
• The output invites correction explicitly — a profile the user never corrects is a profile that stopped learning

Anti-Patterns

• Do not do tone cosplay — matching vocabulary while inventing judgment is the exact failure this skill replaces
• Do not silently guess on uncovered judgment calls; the ⚠ + list is the contract
• Do not flatter the samples — if two samples contradict each other, surface the contradiction and ask which one is current
• Do not use the profile to impersonate the user to third parties without their framing — the understudy drafts FOR the principal, who remains the byline and the approver

Related

[[api-for-yourself]] is the outward-facing sibling (how others work with you); this is inward (how you think). Store the profile per the [[clone-brief]] and Brain conventions.

Example Trigger Phrases

• "Write it like I would."
• "Learn my style."
• "Draft this as me."
• "Wants an AI that apprentices to their judgment rather than imitating their tone."