Put the instruction first, and fence the material

In a nutshell: Write a prompt a model follows on the first try

Use it when: A prompt carries a document, a transcript or a table, and a short instruction about what to do with it.

MIT

Compiled Command

### Instruction ### Summarise the material below for a reader who has five minutes and has not seen it before. Lead with what changed. Name anything the material leaves undecided. Desired format: - What changed: <one sentence> - Why it matters: <one sentence> - Still undecided: <comma separated list, or "nothing"> ### Material ### <paste the document, transcript or table here>

Characters: 384
Field: Prompt engineering
Authors: DAIR.AI

What it draws on

Lead with what the model is to do, then give it the material. The guide records this as a recommendation rather than a law: "Others recommend that you place instructions at the beginning of the prompt."

Use a clear separator, such as ###, between the instruction and the text it applies to, so neither is read as part of the other.

Be specific about the task and the format you want. The guide is explicit that there are no magic tokens: what helps is a descriptive prompt and a stated output format, and unnecessary detail does not.

Sources

Prompt Engineering Guide — General Tips for Designing Prompts
DAIR.AI — Licensed MIT
Source last checked 2026-09-17

What it draws on

Put the instruction at the beginningFrom Prompt Engineering Guide — General Tips for Designing Prompts

Separate the instruction from the materialFrom Prompt Engineering Guide — General Tips for Designing Prompts

Detail beats lengthFrom Prompt Engineering Guide — General Tips for Designing Prompts

Sources