Write better AI prompts: The COACH framework

If AI keeps giving you mediocre responses, the problem is almost always the prompt — not the tool. The COACH framework gives you a repeatable structure for writing prompts that get usable results the first time: Context, Objective, Audience, Constraints, and Human checks and handoff.

Most people write one vague sentence and expect a great answer. The effort you put into a prompt is directly proportional to the quality of what you get back. COACH fixes that:

Context gives the tool the background it needs (not "I need to send a project update email" but "I'm a product manager at a tech company sending a status update to a senior stakeholder about a launch running 2 weeks behind"). Objective tells it exactly what to produce: not "write something" but "write a three-paragraph email that leads with the delay, explains the reason in one sentence, and ends with a revised timeline." Audience specifies who will read it, which changes everything about tone and detail level. Constraints tell it what to avoid. And Human checks and handoff remind you that AI produces a first draft, but you make it yours.

A well-built COACH prompt takes 40 seconds to write and saves 20 minutes of editing.

The Coach framework:

C — Context: giving AI the background it needs to be actually informed, not guessing

O — Objective: specifying exactly what you want it to produce, with format and structure

A — Audience: how specifying who will read it changes tone, vocabulary, and detail level

C — Constraints: the guardrails that get you something usable faster

H — Human checks and handoff: how to treat AI output as a first draft, not a final answer

Videos by Sammy Goldstein and Bridget Griswold.