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Your first company and task

This guide uses the setup wizard to create a company, connect your accounts and start a first task. The wizard has eight steps, and you can skip any of them.

Your first half hour: create the company and its project, connect the runner and your accounts, add a first task, hire your first agent, then add more tasks.
The first half hour, from the setup wizard to your first agent and tasks.

1. Your company

Type a Company name and a sentence or two under What it's for. The CEO plans the work from this. Choose Create the company, then Next.

Boss Man creates the company's CEO agent and a paused Wiki Maintainer. If the launcher is on (BOSSMAN_LAUNCHER=1 in .env, as Install Boss Man sets), Boss Man also starts the company's runner. If it is off, you start the runner yourself in step 3.

2. A project

A project is a git repository your agents work in. Type a Project name and choose Add the project. Paste the repository address into Git repo, for example https://github.com/you/repo.git.

Under When work is approved, choose Merge into the default branch or Open a pull request. Choose the pull request option if your default branch only accepts pull requests.

3. The runner

Wait for the runner to say Connected. It shows Starting… first, and can take up to a minute. If it says Not started, choose Start runner.

4. Claude

On your own computer, run claude setup-token. It prints a long-lived token for your Claude plan. In the wizard, choose Claude setup-token under Add, paste the token into Value, and save. Then choose Check with Claude, which runs one tiny prompt on the runner.

Using another account? Under Add, choose its kind instead, such as OpenRouter API key, Ollama Cloud API key or Synthetic API key, paste the key and save. In step 7, pick the matching provider.

Paste tokens only into these forms. Never paste one into a chat, a ticket or the wiki, because agents can read those.

5. A git token

Choose Git token (GitHub or Gitea) under Add.

Paste it, save, and choose Check the token against your project. You should see "The token can read and push to the repo."

6. Checks before merging

Under Before merging, Boss Man will, choose the command Boss Man runs before it merges approved work. Boss Man suggests one from your repository. Choose Re-detect if the list looks generic.

7. What pays for the CEO

Under Funding sources, name your plan, for example "Claude Max", and choose the kind Subscription (setup-token). Choose Add, then pick it under "The CEO runs on". Boss Man uses this to track cost and quota.

8. A first task

A task is one piece of work for an agent. To see how tasks differ from features, see Features, tasks and sub-tasks.

Type a Title, for example "Read the repo and propose a roadmap". Tick Give it to your CEO now (it starts straight away). The box shows your CEO's name, which is "CEO" unless you changed it. Choose Add the task to your project. Then choose Finish.

It worked if

A run shows under Runs in the sidebar, and the task moves on the board. If no run shows, see "If nothing starts" below.

Hire your first agent

The CEO needs someone to hand work to.

  1. Open Agents in the sidebar and choose Hire.
  2. Under Start from, pick a role, such as Engineer.
  3. Give it a Name. Under Agent, choose Claude Code, Codex or OpenCode.
  4. Leave Model on Default, or pick one. Under Paid from, pick your funding source.
  5. Read the Instructions and change them to fit your company.
  6. Choose Hire. The button shows the name you typed, for example Hire Sam.

It worked if

The agent shows on the Agents page with Pause and Edit buttons.

Add more tasks and features

Open Projects, open your project, and choose Add task. At the top of the form, choose New task or New feature. A feature is something your users get, and tasks are the work that builds it. If you are not sure which you need, see Features, tasks and sub-tasks.

For a New task, fill in:

If you picked an agent under Assign to, choose Add and start to start it now. Otherwise the button says Add to backlog, and the task waits in Backlog.

For a New feature, fill in the Title, What problem does it solve, and for whom? and, if you like, an Objective or milestone. Tick Ask the CEO to plan it if you want the CEO to break it into tasks now. Then choose Add feature. The feature shows on the Features page.

To follow a task and answer the cards it raises, see The board and Decisions.

Let the CEO question you first

Use this when you have a rough idea but have not worked out the details. The CEO asks you questions until the idea is clear, then adds the task or feature for you.

  1. Open the form as above, choose New task or New feature, and type a Title. Add a rough description if you have one.
  2. Choose Let the CEO question me first. The button only shows if your company has a CEO.
  3. Boss Man opens your chat with the CEO, with your draft in it. The draft is cleared from the form, so it is not added twice.
  4. The CEO checks the board, tasks and features first. Then it asks one question at a time, each with its recommended answer, which you can simply accept. The questions cover the goal and who it is for, what done looks like, edge cases and what is out of scope, the risk, and what it depends on.
  5. It usually takes 3 to 7 questions. To stop early, reply "go".

Boss Man asks the CEO to finish like this:

The CEO replies in the chat with what it added.

Add a task directly when you already know what you want and can write the Done when lines yourself. Let the CEO question you when the idea is rough, or when you are not sure what done looks like, what it touches or how risky it is.

If nothing starts

Check that the agent is not paused, and that Settings > Server and runner says the runner is Connected.

Something wrong or missing? Tell us on GitHub.