Prompting 101
This is the core skill of the whole book. The difference between a useless AI answer and a brilliant one is almost never the AI — it's the request. Good news: writing a good request isn't a technical trick. It's a formula with four blocks, and you already have every ingredient.
You already have this skill
A prompt is simply your message to the AI — the request you type. And here's the secret the "prompt engineering guru" industry doesn't want you to know: there are no magic words. Prompting is just clear delegation. If you have ever briefed a colleague, explained a job to an electrician, or told a tailor how you want a dress altered — you already know how to do this. The tailor version even has the same four parts: what role they're playing (formal wear, not sportswear), your situation (a wedding, next Friday, this fabric), the task (take it in at the waist), and the format (knee-length, no sleeves).
What trips beginners up is that with a human, vagueness gets rescued. Say "write something for the client" to a colleague and they'll ask which client, what about, how formal. The AI usually won't rescue you — it will take your vague request and confidently produce a vague answer. Garbage in, generic out. So the skill is front-loading what a thoughtful colleague would have asked anyway.
The formula: Role + Context + Task + Format
Four blocks. You won't need all four every time — but knowing them means you always know what to add when an answer disappoints.
Block 1 — Role: "act as…"
Telling the AI who to be changes which part of its vast reading it draws on. "Act as an experienced HR manager", "You are a friendly physics teacher", "Respond as a strict proofreader". A role sets vocabulary, priorities, and standards in one line. Skip it for simple tasks; use it whenever expertise or a specific perspective matters.
Block 2 — Context: the single biggest lever
If you improve only one thing about your prompts, improve this. Context is your situation: who you are, who it's for, what constraints exist, what's already been tried. The AI knows almost everything about the world and absolutely nothing about you — your budget, your boss's mood, your deadline — unless you say it. Most disappointing answers are missing-context problems wearing a disguise.
Block 3 — Task: one clear verb
Say exactly what you want done: draft, summarise, compare, translate, list, critique, rewrite, plan. One task per message works dramatically better than five. "Fix the grammar, also make it shorter, also translate it, also suggest a subject line, also…" — each extra "also" dilutes all the others. Chain them as follow-ups instead.
Block 4 — Format: say what it should look like
Length ("under 150 words"), structure ("bullet points", "a table with 3 columns", "numbered steps"), language ("in Bangla", "simple English"), style ("formal", "no jargon"). If you don't specify, you get the AI's default — usually longer and more essay-shaped than you wanted.
Before and after: the difference on the page
Here's the formula's effect on one everyday task — asking for help with a salary negotiation. Same AI, same day, two prompts:
| Vague prompt | Specific prompt | |
|---|---|---|
| What was typed | "help me ask for a raise" | "Act as a career coach. I'm a graphic designer at a Dhaka ad agency, 3 years in, no raise in 2 years, and I just led our biggest client project. My manager avoids conflict. Draft what I should say in the meeting — under 200 words, respectful but firm, ending with a specific ask." |
| What came back | A generic lecture: "Research market rates. Choose a good time. Be confident. Practice beforehand…" — advice you could find on any careers blog, addressed to nobody in particular. | A ready-to-rehearse script: it opens by citing the client project, pre-empts the conflict-avoiding manager with a collaborative tone, names a concrete number range to ask for, and ends with a clear next step. You could walk into the meeting with it. |
| Why | No role, no context, no format — so the AI wrote for an imaginary average person. | Every block present. Fifteen extra seconds of typing bought an answer about your meeting. |
Treat every new chat like a brilliant employee's first day. They're enormously capable but know nothing about your company, your customers, or your taste. Hand them a one-line instruction and you'll get a competent-but-generic result. Hand them a proper brief — background, goal, constraints, example of what "good" looks like — and they'll amaze you. The AI is that employee, every single chat, forever on day one.
Three secret weapons
Beyond the formula, three moves consistently separate okay results from great ones:
- Show an example. Nothing communicates taste like a sample. "Here's a product description I love: [paste]. Write mine in the same style." One good example beats three paragraphs of description. (The technical crowd calls this few-shot prompting — "shot" just means example.)
- Name the audience. "…for my 65-year-old landlord", "…for busy parents skimming on a phone", "…for a bank officer reviewing loan applications". The same information gets completely re-tuned — vocabulary, length, what to emphasise — the moment the AI knows who's reading.
- Make it interview you. The most underrated trick in this book: end your prompt with "Before answering, ask me 3–5 questions that would help you do this well." Now the AI extracts the context you didn't think to give — exactly like a good consultant would. Perfect for anything complex or personal.
Act as [role — e.g. an experienced HR manager / a careful financial explainer / a friendly English teacher]. My situation: [2–4 sentences — who you are, what's going on, any constraints like budget, deadline, people involved]. Task: [one clear verb — draft / summarise / compare / plan / rewrite] [the thing]. Format: [length, bullets or table or paragraphs, language, tone]. Before answering, ask me up to 3 questions if anything important is unclear.
I need to write a difficult message and I want it to land well. Who it's to: [person and your relationship — e.g. my landlord / a client / my team lead] What I need to say: [the honest, blunt version — don't polish it] What I'm worried about: [e.g. sounding rude / being ignored / damaging the relationship] Draft the message: under 150 words, respectful but clear, ending with one specific request. Then give me a one-line tip on when to send it.
I want you to interview me first. I need help with: [one sentence — e.g. planning my parents' 30th anniversary / choosing between two job offers / writing my CV summary]. Ask me questions ONE AT A TIME — up to 5 — to gather what you need. Then give me your best answer, tailored to everything I told you.
The four classic beginner mistakes
| Mistake | What it looks like | The fix |
|---|---|---|
| Too vague | "write something about our shop for Facebook" | Add context and format: what shop, what occasion, what tone, how long. |
| Five tasks in one message | "summarise this, fix errors, translate it, and make a poster caption" | One task per message; send the rest as follow-ups. |
| Assuming it knows your situation | "should I take the offer?" (what offer?) | It knows nothing about you until you say it. Two sentences of background transform the answer. |
| Accepting the first draft | Reading answer #1, shrugging, closing the tab | The first answer is the opening bid. Push back — that's the entire next topic, The Art of the Follow-up. |
The formula is a checklist for when answers disappoint, not a form to fill in every time. "What's a good side dish for khichuri?" needs no role and no format — just ask. Start simple; add blocks when the answer isn't good enough. And if you find yourself typing the same role-and-context block into every chat, there's a better way: custom instructions can say it once, permanently (Chapter 5).
Key takeaways
- Prompting is clear delegation, not magic words. If you've ever briefed a colleague, you have the skill.
- The formula: Role + Context + Task + Format. Use the blocks you need; add the missing one when an answer disappoints.
- Context is the biggest lever — the AI knows the world but knows nothing about you until you tell it.
- Three weapons: paste an example of what you want, name the audience, and ask the AI to interview you first.
- One task per message. Vague in, generic out.
- The first draft is never the end — the follow-up is where the quality lives.