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K-06K-Series · Foundation

Writing Better AI Briefs

The single biggest difference between people who find AI useful and people who find it disappointing is the brief. Vague request in, vague draft out — exactly like delegating to a person. The good news: if you’ve ever briefed a new starter well, you already have this skill. This card gives it a repeatable shape.

Why this matters

AI has no context you don’t give it. It doesn’t know your audience, your organisation’s tone, what’s already been decided, or what the document is actually for. When people type ‘write a report about the project’ and get generic mush back, the tool didn’t fail — the brief did. Five minutes of framing routinely saves an hour of fixing, and framing is the first human bookend: nobody can do it for you.

The five-part brief

• GOAL — what you need, in one sentence. ‘A one-page update on the intranet project for the steering committee.’
• CONTEXT — what it can’t know. ‘Phase one delivered late; the committee is nervous; the go-live date hasn’t changed.’
• AUDIENCE — who reads it and how formal they expect it. ‘Senior managers, plain English, no jargon.’
• CONSTRAINTS — tone, length, what to avoid. ‘Under 400 words. Don’t speculate about phase three. Never promise dates we haven’t confirmed.’
• OUTPUT — the format you want back. ‘Three headed sections: progress, risks, next steps.’

Goal, context, audience, constraints, output. Say them in that order and the draft that comes back starts near the target instead of near the average of the internet.

A worked contrast

Weak brief: ‘Summarise this meeting.’ You’ll get a bland paragraph that flattens the one decision that mattered.

Strong brief: ‘Summarise this transcript for team members who weren’t there. Lead with decisions made, then actions as a list with owner and due date, then open questions. Keep it under 300 words and don’t paraphrase the budget figures — quote them exactly.’ Same tool, same transcript, unrecognisably better result — because the thinking arrived with the request.

When the draft comes back wrong

Diagnose before you re-roll. Wrong content usually means missing context; wrong tone means the audience wasn’t specified; wrong shape means no output format. Fix the brief, not just the draft — that’s how the skill compounds instead of resetting every task.

Putting it into practice

1. Save the five headings as a snippet: GOAL / CONTEXT / AUDIENCE / CONSTRAINTS / OUTPUT
2. Use it on one real task today — two minutes of filling in, honestly
3. When output disappoints, identify which of the five was thin
4. Keep your best briefs; recurring tasks deserve reusable briefs
5. Notice the transfer: this structure improves your human delegation too