Write an AI brief with a clear goal and firm boundaries

A long prompt is not necessarily a useful brief. What matters is whether the task, relevant information and limits are clear. Treat the brief as a working instruction that another person could also understand, rather than a collection of dramatic commands to make an AI perform better.

Start with one useful output

Name the reader and the job the output must do. An illustrative request might be to prepare a short internal summary of an approved service description for a new colleague. Specify the intended length and structure, and say that the result remains a draft for review.

Keep separate tasks separate. Asking for analysis, a new strategy and polished publication copy at once can make it difficult to see which conclusion came from your input and which was added along the way.

Distinguish facts from instructions

Provide only the material needed for the task and identify its purpose. Mark a current approved description differently from an old example that shows tone. Google's prompt guidance recommends clear instructions and context; the practical aim is to remove ambiguity about what the system should use.

Do not include confidential or personal information unless the chosen tool and your organisation's rules permit that use. Replace unnecessary identifying details with a fictional example. More data is not automatically a better brief.

State what must not be invented

Tell the system to flag missing information instead of filling it with company claims, customer quotations or unsupported figures. If the source says nothing about a delivery promise, the draft should not create one because it sounds reassuring.

Describe the output form directly. For the internal summary, you could request a short introduction, three useful points and a separate list of unanswered questions. This makes missing information visible without turning guesses into finished prose.

Review and revise one uncertainty at a time

Compare the result with the supplied material. Check names, quantities, promises and the distinction between an example and a real fact. If a paragraph misses the task, explain the specific mismatch rather than asking vaguely for something more professional.

Keep the approved brief and the reviewed result together. When the task repeats, update the underlying facts before reusing the instruction. A good brief makes review easier; it does not remove the responsibility to check what the system produced.

Sources: Google AI for Developers: Prompt design strategies.