First Impressions on Claude Cowork

Had my first genuinely different moment with Claude Cowork this week.

I needed to cross-reference a handful of spreadsheets in a specific Google Drive folder to track down one serial number. Normally that's fifteen minutes: opening tabs, running find, losing my place somewhere in the middle.

This time I pointed Cowork at the folder, kept working on something else, and came back to the answer.

What stood out was the offload. For the first time, an agent worked the way a junior colleague works: go do this while I do that, rather than write me something. Small task, but real time back.

What I'm curious about next is the harder version: shared folders, mixed permissions, audit trails, and the moments where close enough isn't close enough.

If you've tried Cowork, or anything like it, on real work yet, I'd love to hear what's landing and what isn't.