job-outreach

name	job-outreach
description	Research a company or hiring manager, draft a personalized cold email in chat, get approval, send via local msmtp, log for day-7 follow-up tracking. Proactively invoke this skill (do NOT answer conversationally) when the user mentions reaching out to a hiring manager / VP / recruiter / director, pastes a LinkedIn profile URL, pastes a person's email, says "cold email this person", "reach out to the VP at X", "draft an email to the hiring manager", "message this recruiter", "send outreach to this lead", "email the director at Y", "can you write them", "I want to contact someone at Z", or invokes /job-outreach. Always research before drafting — never write a generic email.
argument-hint	<company | LinkedIn URL | email address | freeform target>
allowed-tools	["Bash","Read","Write","WebFetch","WebSearch"]

Job Outreach

A skill (not an API call) for cold outreach. Claude — this agent — does the research and drafting. A small Node script sends via msmtp. A CSV logs the send.

This is the pattern behind the 228+ cold emails that led to the GFT offer in 12 days. Keep it short, honest, and specific to the person. Never auto-send.

Repo location

$AI_JOB_AGENT_ROOT → ~/.claude/skills/ai-job-agent/ → REPO_PATH marker file → ~/ai-job-agent/.

Prerequisites

Before drafting anything:

1. msmtp installed (command -v msmtp should resolve). If not, tell the user:

   brew install msmtp
   

   and configure ~/.msmtprc with their Gmail app password. See docs/SETUP.md#cold-email-setup-msmtp--gmail. Stop until set up.

2. config/candidate-profile.md exists (required for personalization). If not, tell the user to run bash wizard.sh first.

3. outreach-log.csv exists at $AI_JOB_AGENT_ROOT/outreach-log.csv. If not, copy from templates/outreach-log.template.csv.

Workflow

Step 1 — Understand the target

Parse $ARGUMENTS. It might be:

• A company name (e.g. "GFT Infrastructure")
• A LinkedIn profile URL (linkedin.com/in/...)
• A direct email ([e-mail])
• Freeform ("the VP of Power Services at GFT" — ask a clarifying question if ambiguous)

Load config/candidate-profile.md so you know who is sending (Akbar's pitch, resume variants, work auth, graduation date, key projects).

Step 2 — Research

Use WebSearch + WebFetch to pull 3-5 facts about the company and the person. Aim for:

• What the company actually does (not the generic pitch — specifically: what project, what market, what recent news)
• The person's role and relevant recent activity (recent post, team they lead, quoted in an article)
• A credible hook — one thing the sender has actually done that connects to their work (not "passionate about your mission")

If you can't find anything specific after ~3 searches, tell the user "I can't find anything concrete to personalize with — do you have any context (a mutual connection, a talk they gave, an article)?" and wait for them.

Step 3 — Draft (framework, not template)

Write one email — 4 short paragraphs, ~130-160 words total. No fluff.

Block	Length	Content
Hook	1-2 sentences	The specific thing about this person/company (from Step 2). Not "I was impressed by…" — a concrete observation.
Who you are	1-2 sentences	Name, school/year, the single most relevant fact for them (not a résumé dump).
Proof	1-2 sentences	One thing you've actually built/done that connects to their work. Link if possible.
Ask	1 sentence	A low-cost ask — 15 minutes to chat, a resume review, or "is there anyone on your team I should reach out to." Never "a job."

Hard rules:

• First person, conversational. Contractions fine.
• No "passionate about" / "excited about" / "I hope this email finds you well."
• No buzzwords ("synergy", "leverage", "align").
• If the target is non-English-speaking (e.g. Uzbekistan) and the candidate profile supports it, offer a multilingual version as a second draft.
• If the recipient is in Uzbek/Russian-speaking context, slip one line in their language (per Akbar's actual past practice).

Step 4 — Present the draft for approval

Render exactly this structure in chat:

**Draft #1** · to: Paul Young <[e-mail]> · from: [e-mail]

Subject: Intern interest — substation engineering, 60+ active projects

<4 paragraphs>

---

Sources I used to personalize this:
- <url 1> — <1-line what it gave you>
- <url 2> — <…>

Send, edit, or cancel? (send / edit / cancel)

Step 5 — Handle the response

• send → go to Step 6.
• edit → ask "what should I change?" and regenerate. Loop until send or cancel.
• cancel → do nothing, don't log. Tell the user "nothing sent, nothing logged."

Step 6 — Save and send

1. Save the body to a file so it's recoverable:

   $AI_JOB_AGENT_ROOT/outreach/<YYYY-MM-DD>-<company-slug>-<recipient-slug>.txt
   

   Create the outreach/ directory if it doesn't exist.

2. Build a JSON payload:

   {
     "from": "Akbar Kamoldinov <[e-mail]>",
     "to": "[e-mail]",
     "subject": "…",
     "body": "…full body…",
     "reply_to": "[e-mail]"
   }
   

   Source the from from the candidate profile; default to [e-mail]. Ask the user if you're unsure whose inbox to send from.

3. Always dry-run first:

   echo "$PAYLOAD" | node "$AI_JOB_AGENT_ROOT/scripts/send-cold-email.js" --dry-run
   

   Show the user the raw RFC822 preview. Confirm one more time: "Actually send? (y/n)"

4. On y, send for real:

   echo "$PAYLOAD" | node "$AI_JOB_AGENT_ROOT/scripts/send-cold-email.js"
   

5. Parse the JSON output. ok: true + a messageId + sentAt means it went.

Step 7 — Log

Append one row to $AI_JOB_AGENT_ROOT/outreach-log.csv:

column	value
sent_at	sentAt from the script output
company	target company
role	role you're pitching for (often "Intern — Substation Engineering")
to_name	full name
to_email	email
to_title	their title at the company
to_linkedin	LinkedIn URL if used
subject	subject line
body_file	relative path to the saved body file
message_id	messageId from the script output
status	sent
replied_at	empty
follow_up_count	0
last_follow_up_at	empty
notes	1-line summary of the personalization hook (useful for follow-up)

Step 8 — Confirm and suggest next

Print:

Field	Value
✉️ To	Paul Young <[e-mail]>
📝 Subject	…
🔗 Message-ID	<…>
⏱️ Sent	2026-04-22T23:11:00Z
💾 Body saved to	outreach/2026-04-22-gft-paul-young.txt
📒 Logged	outreach-log.csv (row N)

Then nudge: "Want me to draft another for a different person at the same company?" — don't auto-do, wait.

Safety rails

• Never send without the explicit send confirmation after seeing the draft, AND a second y after the dry-run preview. Two gates.
• Never lie about credentials, projects, or authorization. If the profile says "F-1 CPT-eligible, no current sponsorship needed," don't write "authorized to work with no restrictions."
• If the subject line needs a company name, verify the spelling from the research sources — "Worley" vs "Worleyparsons" is a cold-email dealbreaker.
• If the email address was guessed (not verified in research), flag it clearly to the user before sending.
• Do not send more than 1 email to the same to_email in the same day — check the log before sending.

Related skills

• /job-followup — day-7 follow-up checker for rows in outreach-log.csv that haven't replied.
• /job-track — the Google-Sheet–backed application tracker (a different file; formal ATS applications).