Albert Einstein is quoted as saying: “If I had an hour to solve a problem, I’d spend 55 minutes thinking about the problem and 5 minutes thinking about solutions.”

An AI conversation should begin with a good prompt that provides the AI tool with clear, specific instructions. The Office of Innovative Technologies (OIT) recommends these steps for effective prompting:

• Be clear about your goal. State exactly what you want the AI to do.
• Give details. Instead of a broad, general request, include information about the task and audience. For example, “Summarize this article in three sentences for a college audience.”
• Use the right prompt type. Consider how open-ended questions, step-by-step instructions, and role-based prompts might result in different answers.
• Test and adjust. Try a prompt, review the results, and refine the wording as needed.

You don’t have to be a physicist to use AI. Applying these simple AI formulas will result in more accurate and useful responses.
For more guidance, visit the OIT Introduction to Prompting resource.