Board prep usually means an hour of digging: last quarter's numbers, the plan, notes from the last meeting, what the founder promised, and what you promised. This skill does that digging for you. Name a portfolio company and it pulls everything since the last board meeting from Visible, checks the founder's board deck against Visible's numbers when the deck is available, and writes a one to two page brief that leads with the three questions most worth asking. Nothing changes in Visible unless you confirm it.
Setup
Download this Skill file: board-meeting-prep.skill
Upload it in Claude under Settings > Capabilities > Skills.
Make sure the Visible for Investors connector is connected in Claude. That's the only requirement.
Optional connectors make the brief sharper. Google Calendar finds the meeting date, attendees, and the last board meeting. Granola (or a similar meeting notes tool) brings in what was discussed and promised last time. Google Drive or Gmail lets Claude find the founder's board deck. Slack adds internal discussion about the company if you ask for it. If a connector isn't there, Claude skips it and keeps going.
There's no first-run setup. Claude only asks a question when it has to: which company you mean if several match, or the meeting date if it can't find one on your calendar.
Running it
Tell Claude something like:
"Prep me for Aquacell's board meeting on Thursday"
"What should I ask Aquacell at tomorrow's board meeting?"
"Check Aquacell's board deck against what's in Visible"
Type the / command and find the skill
One company per run. The brief covers a single portfolio company and a single meeting. Run it again for each board you sit on.
Quick question, quick answer. Ask a short question like "what should I ask Aquacell tomorrow?" and Claude answers in the chat. Ask for full prep and you get a brief you can keep and read on your phone: a Claude Doc, a Google Doc if you ask for one and Drive is connected, or a markdown file.
Run it a day or two before the meeting. Founders usually share the board deck a few days ahead, so that's when the deck check has something to compare.
What gets flagged
Claude keeps only what's notable. A metric that's on plan usually doesn't get a line.
Area | What makes it notable |
Performance vs plan | A key metric 10% or more off plan, or moving the wrong direction for two periods in a row. |
Runway | Under 12 months means a fundraise or cost plan belongs on the agenda. Under six months is urgent. |
Commitments | Anything the company or your firm promised last time with no evidence it happened. |
Deck vs Visible | Any number in the founder's deck that doesn't match Visible for the same period. |
Data gaps | No recent reporting from the company. Asking for current numbers moves to the top of the question list. |
What it actually does
The instructions below are packaged into the skill file. You don't need them to use it, but here's what's happening under the hood.
Finding "since when." What changed only means something against a starting point, so Claude looks for the last board meeting date. It checks your calendar first, then meeting notes from Granola or a similar tool, then Visible notes that mention a board meeting, then asks you. If none of those work, it falls back to the last completed quarter and says so in the brief.
Pulling the position. Claude reads your fund's investments in the company, including cost, fair value, and ownership by fund, plus the latest round's name, date, price per share, and post-money. If a later round priced differently but the mark is still the initial one, the brief notes that the position is carried at cost.
Pulling metrics with context. Claude pulls at least five quarters of metrics so the year-ago period is included. It pairs each actual with its budgeted version from Visible, compares values at the last meeting with current values, and ignores numbers for a period that hasn't finished yet unless it labels them as partial. Per-fund investment metrics are never added across funds.
Calculating runway itself. Claude works out months of runway from cash and burn and compares it with what the company reports. Quarterly burn is converted to monthly before the math.
Checking last meeting's commitments. From meeting notes and Visible notes, Claude lists what the company said it would do and whether there's evidence it happened. It does the same for what your side offered, like intros or hiring help.
Comparing the deck to Visible. If the founder's board deck is in Drive, Gmail, or uploaded to the chat, Claude compares its numbers with Visible's for the same periods. Differences are often innocent, like a restatement or a different revenue definition, so each one becomes a question, never an accusation. If the deck isn't found, the brief says so and the rest goes ahead.
Writing questions you'd ask in the room. Every question is tied to a specific number, note, or commitment. "How's hiring going?" doesn't make the cut. "You planned 12 engineering hires by Q3 and made five; what's blocking it?" does.
The brief
One to two pages, marked internal for your fund. Every number comes with a period and a comparison, like "$8.3M ARR (Q3 2026), 10% below plan of $9.1M." Sections with nothing in them are dropped.
[Company] board meeting prep [Meeting date] | Internal: prepared for [fund] only | Data from Visible as of [date]Headline How the company is doing, and the single most important issue for this meeting.Our position One line per fund: security, cost, fair value, ownership. Latest round.Since the last board meeting ([date]) Table of 5 to 8 metrics: last meeting, current, plan, status. Two to four bullets on what changed and why.Runway and capital Cash, monthly burn, months of runway (calculated and as reported).Commitments from last meeting What the company committed to, with status. What we committed to, with status.Board deck vs. Visible (only if the deck was available) Metric, deck number, Visible number, likely explanation.Questions to ask 1. [Question, phrased as you'd ask it] Why: [the fact behind it] 2. ... 3. ... Up to five more, grouped by performance, plan, team, capital.How we can help One to three concrete offers. Skipped if nothing specific fits.
An example priority question: "ARR landed at $8.3M against a $9.1M plan. Which part of the gap is pipeline that slipped into Q4, and which part is deals you don't expect to close?" The why line underneath: ARR is 10% below plan for Q3, the second quarter in a row below plan.
What lands in Visible
Nothing, unless you say yes. After the brief, Claude offers once to:
Save the brief as a portfolio note on the company in Visible, so your team has a record. This only happens if you say yes.
Turn your post-meeting notes into a Visible note with action items. Share your notes or a meeting transcript after the meeting, and next quarter's prep has the commitments to check. For a broader workflow, see Granola Notes to Visible.
Worth knowing
Everything Claude reads from Visible is read-only. Saving a note is the only write, and only after you confirm.
The brief can include candid internal views, so it's marked internal for your fund. Don't paste it anywhere the founder can see.
Claude doesn't wait on the deck. If it isn't found, the brief says so and suggests asking the founder for it.
A company that hasn't reported recently gets flagged for it, and asking for current numbers becomes the first question.
For a pre-call brief on every portfolio company meeting in your week, see Pre-Meeting Brief Pack.