Office Tells
A behavioral overlay on top of the pptx, docx, and xlsx skills. It does not replace them, it constrains them. The format skill handles how to build the file; Office Tells strips the signals that mark a document as machine-generated before it ships: pipe separators, em dashes, accent lines under slide titles, beige or default-blue or default-grey color choices, zebra table banding, excessive conditional formatting, Sheet1 names, library-default file metadata, hardcoded totals where a formula belongs, and boilerplate section names. The file type alone is the trigger, no anti-AI wording required. The final step renders the file to images and inspects the metadata, because the visual rules cannot be enforced without actually looking at the output. Running prose voice is delegated to the human-tone skill.
What it does
Anti-AI quality gate that strips the visual, structural, and metadata tells from every PowerPoint, Word, and Excel file Claude generates
How to use this
Once it is installed, this skill picks itself up. You do not need to name it.
- Created by
- Brian Aber
- Category
- Productivity
- Source
- View source
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Office Tells
A behavioral overlay on top of the pptx, docx, and xlsx skills. It does not replace them, it constrains them. The format skill handles how to build the file; Office Tells strips the signals that mark a document as machine-generated before it ships: pipe separators, em dashes, accent lines under slide titles, beige or default-blue or default-grey color choices, zebra table banding, excessive conditional formatting, Sheet1 names, library-default file metadata, hardcoded totals where a formula belongs, and boilerplate section names. The file type alone is the trigger, no anti-AI wording required. The final step renders the file to images and inspects the metadata, because the visual rules cannot be enforced without actually looking at the output. Running prose voice is delegated to the human-tone skill.
First-party, by Brian Aber
June 2, 2026
Simple install — no setup required
Open the Claude desktop app and go to the Project you want this in
Go to Code, then Customize, then click Create a new skill and upload the skill file below
Say a trigger phrase to activate it
Download the skill file below
In ChatGPT, create a Project and attach the file (or paste its contents into the project instructions). For a reusable setup, build a Custom GPT via Explore GPTs → Create and add the file there
Start a chat in that Project or GPT, then say a trigger phrase to activate it
Download the skill file below
Place it at .cursor/skills/office-tells/SKILL.md (rename the downloaded file to SKILL.md). The shared .agents/skills/office-tells/SKILL.md path also works
Cursor loads the skill when your task matches its description. Say a trigger phrase to activate it
Download the skill file below
Place it at .github/skills/office-tells/SKILL.md in your repository (rename the downloaded file to SKILL.md)
Copilot loads the skill when it is relevant to your task. Say a trigger phrase to activate it
Download the skill file below
Place it at .agents/skills/office-tells/SKILL.md in your repository (rename the downloaded file to SKILL.md)
Codex loads the skill when your task matches, or invoke it explicitly with /skills. Say a trigger phrase to activate it
Download the skill file below
In Gemini, create a Gem, then upload the skill file as a knowledge file
Copy the Gem instructions with the button below, then paste them into the instructions box
Start a chat with the Gem, then say a trigger phrase to activate it
You are a Gem built around the "Office Tells" skill. Anti-AI quality gate that strips the visual, structural, and metadata tells from every PowerPoint, Word, and Excel file Claude generates Read the attached file first, then follow its instructions. Activate this skill when the user says something like: make a deck, build a pitch deck, write a report, create a spreadsheet, build a financial model.
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What this skill does
This is an overview of the skill from the site, not the skill's real instructions. The full SKILL.md Claude reads when this skill is active lives on GitHub at the source below.
This skill is a behavioral overlay, not a document generator. It sits on top of the pptx, docx, and xlsx skills and constrains them. The format skill tells Claude how to build the file; Office Tells strips the signals that give it away as machine-generated before it ships.
What it does
Claude can build a clean .pptx, .docx, or .xlsx and still leave fingerprints all over it: a thin accent line under every slide title, a beige default background, zebra-striped table rows, a sheet called Sheet1, file metadata that names the python library, totals typed in as values instead of =SUM() formulas. None of those survive someone who actually looks. Office Tells is the gate that catches them.
The file type is the trigger. Ask Claude to make a deck, write a report, build a budget, or produce any Office file, and this skill loads first, before a single line of code or content is written. The user does not have to say “make it look human” for it to fire.
The three formats
Each format has its own tells, and the skill carries a rule set for each one:
- PowerPoint: no accent lines under titles, no repeated layouts, varied bullet counts and lengths, real typographic hierarchy, no generic corporate blue or beige defaults.
- Word: no Introduction-Overview-Conclusion boilerplate, no zebra table banding, at most two accent colors, roomy cell padding, a single thin grey rule instead of rainbow dividers.
- Excel: specific human sheet names, frozen headers, live formulas for every total, restrained conditional formatting, deliberate header colors instead of the openpyxl default grey.
Across all three, the universal rules ban pipe separators and em dashes, require real file metadata with a plausible author and a created time that differs from modified, and push for lumpy, realistic example data instead of suspiciously round numbers.
Render and look
The last rule matters most. Claude generates these files blind through python libraries and cannot trust that the visual rules held. So the final step is to convert the file to images, view them, and check them against a delivery list, then confirm the metadata is set. The visual rules are unenforceable without that step, so the skill refuses to skip it.
Voice is delegated
Office Tells owns structural language: slide titles, section headers, sheet names, table labels, callouts. Sentence-level prose voice is handed off to the human-tone skill, which runs on any paragraph or body copy. The two skills stack cleanly, one shapes the structure, the other shapes the sentences.
View full SKILL.md on GitHub