Ninety percent of bad AI answers come from thin questions. A good request has three parts:
- Context. Who you are, what the situation is, what you have tried.
- Goal. What you actually want to walk away with.
- Format. How you want it: length, tone, language, bullet points or prose.
Compare "write an email to my landlord" with "My landlord in Ljubljana has not fixed the boiler for 3 weeks despite two polite emails. Write a firm but civil email in Slovenian, max 150 words, referencing my right to a functioning heating system."
Why this works
Claude cannot see your life, only your words. Every detail you give is literally the only material it has to work with. Context is not politeness, it is the raw input.
Practice
Take one real message you need to send this week. Use this template:
Context: [who you are, what happened, anything relevant]
Goal: [what you want the message to achieve]
Write it as: [email / SMS / letter], [tone], [language], max [X] words.
Before writing, ask me up to 3 questions if anything important is missing.
Done when: you sent a real message that Claude drafted and you only lightly edited.