Answer quality mirrors request quality. Try these ten patterns once; after that they become reflex.
1. Rewrite with a defined tone. “Rewrite this for the CEO of a distribution company, formal, two paragraphs max.” Audience + tone + length.
2. Executive summary. “Summarize this report in five points; one sentence each, with numbers where present.”
3. Comparison table. “Compare these three options on cost, time and risk in one table.”
4. Role-play the audience. “You are our toughest customer; what objections do you raise to this proposal?”
5. Multi-version output. “Give three versions of this message: short for SMS, medium for e-mail, full for a letter.”
6. Checklist extraction. “Turn this procedure into a step-by-step operational checklist.”
7. Ask the document. Attach a knowledge base and ask: “Per the policy, what is the out-of-town per-diem cap?” The answer comes grounded in the text.
8. Structured extraction. “Pull the names, dates and amounts from this text into a table.”
9. Stepwise refinement. When the answer lands, adjust in place: “shorter,” “use an Iranian example,” “expand point three.” The conversation has memory.
10. A complete task for an agent. Hand over multi-step work whole: “From these ten CVs, shortlist three with reasons.” The agent does the searching and analysis itself.
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