Seven Prompt Engineering Patterns That Survive Model Upgrades

Stop optimising vocabulary

Magic phrases stop working the moment a model is retrained. Structure does not. Every durable pattern below changes what information the model has, not how politely you ask for it.

The patterns

Specify the output contract before the task. Give one worked example rather than five vague rules. Put long reference material above the instruction. Ask for a plan, then execute the plan in a second call.

Make failure legal: give the model an explicit escape hatch so it declines instead of inventing.

Version your prompts

Prompts are code. Keep them in the repo, review changes, and attach an eval score to every revision.