Instructions That Survive Contact
Last timeWhat the Model Actually Sees
A rule that reads well to a person often fails on the odd input. What survives is positive, specific, one job at a time, and tested on the cases that break it.
Say what to do, not what to avoid
The most reliable single improvement to a set of instructions is to turn the
negative ones round.
An instruction that forbids something has to name it. Do not mention the
competitor puts the competitor into the document. Do not apologise puts
apologising there. Never speculate about delivery dates raises the subject of
delivery dates. The model is not being contrary; the material is simply present,
and a document about what not to do is still a document about that thing.
The repair is to describe the behaviour wanted instead. What should the reply
contain when a customer asks about a competitor? Say that, and the forbidden
thing never appears.
| names the unwanted thing | says what to do instead | checkable from the reply | violations per thousand | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| do not mention delivery | 1 | 0 | 0 | 41 |
| when asked about deliver | 0 | 1 | 1 | 6 |
| never apologise | 1 | 0 | 0 | 33 |
| open with the fact rathe | 0 | 1 | 1 | 9 |
| do not use bullet points | 1 | 0 | 1 | 18 |
| write in full sentences | 0 | 1 | 1 | 4 |
One instruction, one job
The second common failure is the sentence carrying several requirements, which
gets followed in parts.
Reply in British English, in no more than three sentences, in a warm tone, and
always end by offering further help. That is four rules, and there is no
mechanism that makes them atomic. In practice the first and last survive and
the middle two are intermittent, which looks mysterious until the sentence is
split.
| step | as written | requirements inside it | followed before splitting | followed after |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | one sentence with four requirements | 4 | 52 per cent of replies met all four | 88 per cent |
| 2 | the British English part alone | 1 | 94 per cent | 96 per cent |
| 3 | the three sentence limit alone | 1 | 61 per cent | 93 per cent |
| 4 | the warm tone part alone | 1 | 80 per cent | 91 per cent |
| 5 | the offer of further help alone | 1 | 89 per cent | 97 per cent |
Two further habits belong here. Put the rules in a numbered list rather than a
paragraph, since a list is read as a set of separate items by anything, human
or otherwise. And keep each rule to one clause, because a clause with an except
in it is two rules wearing a coat.
The lesson stops here
4 more paragraphs to go
You have read the opening. The rest of the argument, the problems that check whether it landed, and the lines worth keeping at the end all come with a plan.
The first lesson of every course in the library reads the whole way through, free, so you can see exactly what the rest of them are.
See the planThe contentsThis is the reading half
Starting the course gives you your own copy of it. Every idea on every page has problems standing under it, marked with a reason rather than a tick, and any sentence you do not believe can be opened and argued with. None of that can happen on a page nobody owns.
The contents