Hand off active deals when a rep is out
Images on this page are for illustrative purposes only. Example outputs in this play are illustrative — the structure, fields, and format reflect real Lusha, Gmail, Calendar, Drive, and Slack connector output, but were not pulled from a live session. Run the prompt with your own data and connectors to see live results. Personal details in any live examples are masked or abbreviated for privacy.
A rep goes out sick with two meetings tomorrow and a proposal due Friday. The covering rep has no idea what’s in any of these deals. This Claude prompt fixes that — Google Calendar pulls upcoming meetings, Gmail surfaces every open thread and commitment, Lusha validates every deal contact, and the complete handoff doc lands in Google Drive with a Slack notification to the covering rep. Five connectors. One pass. The covering rep walks in with full context.
Tools: Claude, Lusha, Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Drive, Slack
The prompt
This prompt may contain placeholders — look for [BRACKETS] and fill them in.
<context>
I'm going to be out — sick day, leave, or vacation — and I have active deals and scheduled meetings that need to be covered. Before I hand off, I want to create a complete coverage brief for whoever is taking over: every upcoming meeting, every open thread, every open commitment, and the current status of every active deal. The covering rep should be able to walk into any conversation without asking me anything.
My handoff:
- Covering rep: [NAME OR "TBD"]
- Dates I'll be out: [DATE RANGE]
- Active deals: [PASTE DEAL NAME, COMPANY, STAGE, ACV — one per line, OR "find from Gmail and Calendar"]
- Where to save the handoff doc: [GOOGLE DRIVE FOLDER LINK OR "save to My Drive"]
- Slack channel to notify: [CHANNEL NAME OR "skip"]
</context>
<task>
1. Pull all upcoming external meetings from Google Calendar for the dates I'll be out:
- Company, attendees, meeting type, time
- For each meeting: what was the last email exchange with this company?
2. Search Gmail for every active deal thread:
- Last topic discussed and outcome
- Any open commitment on my side that needs to be actioned before I leave or by the covering rep
- Any question or request from the prospect that hasn't been answered
- Last touch date
3. Use Lusha to validate the primary contact for each active deal:
- Still at the company in the same role?
- Title changed?
- Any account signal in the last 14 days worth knowing?
4. Build a handoff document and save it to Google Drive:
Structure:
# Deal Handoff — [My Name] — Out [Date Range]
Covering rep: [Name] · Created: [Date]
## Urgent — Action Required Before [First Day Out]
Any open commitment or unanswered question that must be addressed before handoff
## Upcoming Meetings
For each meeting: date, time, company, attendees, what the meeting is about,
one thing to know before joining, prep needed
## Active Deals
For each deal:
- Deal name · Company · Stage · ACV
- Primary contact: verified name, title, email, direct phone
- Current status: where the deal stands in one sentence
- Open commitments: what I owe the prospect, what the prospect owes me
- Account signal: any Lusha signal worth knowing
- Next recommended action for the covering rep
## Contacts — Do Not Disturb
Any contact who has asked not to be contacted, or where I'm mid-negotiation
and extra outreach would be counterproductive
## Context the CRM Doesn't Have
Anything important that lives in my head — relationship nuances,
verbal agreements, background context
5. If a Slack channel is specified: post a brief notification that the handoff doc
is ready, with the Drive link and the covering rep tagged.
</task>
<constraints>
- Every meeting must include "one thing to know before joining" — specific to that account.
- Open commitments must be specific: not "follow up" but exactly what was promised and to whom.
- "Context the CRM doesn't have" is the most important section — prompt the rep if nothing is added.
- Save the doc to Drive before posting to Slack.
</constraints>What you'll get back
The situation: Sarah is going out sick Thursday and Friday. Two external meetings, three active deals, one open commitment that’s overdue. She runs the prompt at 8am before logging off.
Google Drive doc created: “Deal Handoff — Sarah — Out June 5–6” (Drive link posted to #sales-ops)
Deal Handoff — Sarah — Out June 5–6
Covering rep: James · Created: June 5, 2026
Urgent — Action Required Before EOD Today
⚠ ZoomInfo comparison section promised to D.R. at Ashford Platforms on the May 14 call — still not included in the proposal. Send the updated proposal before leaving today or ask James to send it by tomorrow morning at the latest. D.R. is expecting it before the Thursday call.
Upcoming Meetings
Thursday June 5, 2pm — Proposal Review — Ashford Platforms Attendees: D.R. (Head of Sales Strategy & Ops) ✓ · M.L. (Head of Sales Ops) ✓ What it’s about: Reviewing the proposal — specifically HubSpot integration and pricing tiers One thing to know: D.R. knows a ZoomInfo comparison was promised and wasn’t in the original proposal. Address it immediately when joining — “Sarah flagged this needed to be added, here’s the updated version.” Prep needed: Updated proposal with ZoomInfo section · DPA link in Section 6
Friday June 6, 10am — Discovery Call — Dunmore Analytics Attendees: T.K. (VP of Sales) ✓ What it’s about: First discovery call — T.K. replied to cold outreach about pricing 54 days ago, the Series B closed 18 days ago One thing to know: T.K. has been waiting a long time. Don’t apologise excessively — open with the funding angle: “With the Series B just closed, the conversation is probably more relevant now than when we first emailed.” Prep needed: Nothing urgent — fresh discovery call
Active Deals
Ashford Platforms — Proposal — $95K Contact: D.R., Head of Sales Strategy & Ops · d.r@[ashford].com ✓ · mobile available Status: Proposal sent May 27. D.R. replied “looks good — need to loop in legal before signing.” No update in 9 days. Open commitments: ⚠ ZoomInfo comparison section (rep owes) · D.R. to loop in legal team (prospect owes) Signal: No new signal Next action: Send updated proposal with ZoomInfo section today. Follow up on legal timeline Friday after the call.
Dunmore Analytics — Discovery — $72K Contact: T.K., VP of Sales · t.k@[dunmore].com ✓ · mobile available Status: T.K. replied to cold outreach in March asking about pricing. Thread went cold. Series B closed 18 days ago. Discovery call booked for Friday. Open commitments: None — fresh conversation Signal: Series B closed 18 days ago Next action: Run the discovery call on Friday. No prep needed beyond knowing the funding context.
Briarwood SaaS — Discovery — $50K Contact: P.O., VP of Sales · p.o@[briarwood].com ✓ · mobile available Status: No active thread. P.O. replied to cold outreach 11 days ago — no response sent yet. Open commitments: ⚠ P.O. replied and is waiting for a response Signal: None Next action: Reply to P.O. today before Sarah leaves, or James replies Thursday morning.
Contacts — Do Not Disturb
R.F. at Briarwood — prior contact from a 2024 evaluation. No longer at the company per Lusha. Do not email this address.
Context the CRM Doesn’t Have
- D.R. at Ashford mentioned informally on the May 14 call that “the CFO will need to sign off — she’s cautious about new vendors.” The CFO hasn’t been introduced yet. Don’t push for a signature without understanding the CFO’s position first.
- T.K. at Dunmore is a quick decision-maker based on his reply style. If the discovery call goes well on Friday, ask for a follow-up the following week — don’t wait for the standard 2-week cadence.
Slack notification posted to #sales-ops: “Deal handoff doc ready — @james.ae please review before Thursday’s Ashford call. [Drive link]”
Illustrative example — fictional company names used. Run with your own data to see live results.
Why use Lusha in Claude
The “Context the CRM Doesn’t Have” section is the most important part of this document — and the part that almost never gets captured. The CFO note about Ashford — “she’s cautious about new vendors” — came up verbally on a call and was never logged. Without the handoff doc, it stays in Sarah’s head until she’s back. James joins Thursday’s call not knowing there’s an unintroduced CFO who is the actual signer, and the deal stalls on something that was already known. The ZoomInfo urgent flag is the second critical finding: the commitment was already overdue before the sick day, and the handoff doc surfaces it in the Urgent section rather than letting it sit until Sarah returns.
Data drawn from 300M+ verified contacts under GDPR, CCPA, SOC 2, ISO 27701, ISO 31700, and TRUSTe.
FAQ
What if the rep doesn't know who is covering?
Set covering rep to “TBD” — the document is created with a placeholder and the Slack notification goes to the channel without tagging a specific person. A manager can assign the covering rep and tag the right person once coverage is confirmed.
Should this only be run for sick days, or also for planned leave?
Both — but the timing differs. For a sick day, run it immediately before logging off. For planned leave, run it 2–3 days before so the covering rep has time to read the doc, ask questions, and prep for meetings rather than reading it cold on the morning of the first meeting.
What if the "context the CRM doesn't have" section is empty?
The prompt flags it: “This section is empty — add anything here that a colleague wouldn’t know from reading the CRM alone.” This is intentional. The section exists because the institutional knowledge that lives in a rep’s head is exactly what gets lost in a handoff. If it’s empty, the rep is prompted to think about what to add rather than leaving it blank.
Can the covering rep update the doc while the original rep is out?
Yes — the document is a standard Google Drive file. The covering rep can edit, add notes, and update the “next recommended action” section as deals progress. When the original rep returns, the doc serves as a log of what happened during the absence.
How is this different from just sending a summary email to the covering rep?
A summary email gets buried. The Drive doc stays accessible, searchable, and editable throughout the coverage period. The covering rep can open it before any meeting, update it after, and share it with others (manager, SE) without forwarding an email chain. It also includes the Lusha contact validation — which a manually written email never would.
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