Introduction: Course Overview and Learning Objectives
What you'll build, why it matters, and how this course transforms your AI workflow
T1.1: Prompt Engineering Mastery - Build Your 20-Prompt Library
Duration: 90 minutes Prerequisites: None (true beginner level) Target Students: Economics Researchers, Software Engineers, Business Managers
What You'll Build
By the end of this course, create a personal prompt library with 20 tested, production-ready prompts that deliver consistent, high-quality outputs. This isn't about learning theory—build a practical toolkit that saves hours every week.
20-Prompt Library
Five prompts each for general use, economics research, software engineering, and business management
Template System
A framework for rapid prompt customization and iteration
Quality Evaluation Rubric
Objective criteria to assess AI output quality
Domain-Specific Collections
Ready-to-use prompts tailored to your field: Economics (literature reviews, data analysis, citations), Software (code reviews, documentation, tests), Business (competitive analysis, market sizing, customer synthesis)
Why This Matters
The Problem: Most people use AI tools with vague prompts like "Summarize this paper" or "Review this code," then spend hours fixing mediocre outputs. They're working harder, not smarter.
Your Solution: Master the patterns that consistently produce production-quality results. With your 20-prompt library, save 60%+ time on recurring tasks (literature reviews in 10 minutes instead of 30+), get consistent quality across all AI interactions (no more hit-or-miss outputs), work independently without trial-and-error prompt tweaking, and scale your expertise by encoding best practices into reusable templates.
Real Impact:
- Economics researchers process 20 papers in the time it used to take for 5
- Software engineers generate comprehensive test suites in minutes, not hours
- Business managers extract actionable insights from 10+ customer interviews instantly
Learning Objectives
By completing this course, you will be able to:
- Apply fundamental prompting patterns (zero-shot, few-shot, chain-of-thought) to achieve specific outcomes
- Structure AI outputs using JSON, tables, and lists for downstream processing
- Assign effective roles and personas to optimize AI responses for your domain
- Tune parameters (temperature, response length) for different use cases
- Refine prompts iteratively using a systematic improvement process
- Identify and fix common failure modes (hallucinations, formatting errors, incomplete responses)
- Evaluate prompt quality objectively using measurable criteria
- Customize prompts rapidly for new tasks using your template system
- Deploy prompts in production workflows with confidence in consistency
Course Structure
This 90-minute course is divided into focused, actionable sections:
Quick Start (15 minutes)
Get immediate value by creating your first 5 high-impact prompts. Test them on real examples and see measurable quality improvements right away.
Outcome: Working prompts that deliver better results than your current approach.
Core Build (45 minutes)
Systematically build your complete 20-prompt library:
- Part 1 (15 min): Master prompting patterns and build 5 general-purpose prompts
- Part 2 (15 min): Create 5 domain-specific prompts tailored to your field
- Part 3 (15 min): Develop your template system and quality rubric
Outcome: Complete, organized prompt library ready for daily use.
Domain Applications (15 minutes)
Apply your prompts to realistic scenarios from your domain:
- Economics: Extract key findings from 5 papers simultaneously
- Software: Generate comprehensive test coverage for a module
- Business: Synthesize themes from 10 customer interviews
Outcome: Proven, domain-specific workflows that solve actual problems.
Extension Patterns (10 minutes)
Level up with advanced techniques:
- Chain prompts together for complex multi-step workflows
- Use XML tags for precise structural control
- Implement few-shot learning for specialized tasks
Outcome: Advanced capabilities for power users.
Troubleshooting (5 minutes)
Quick reference for common issues and instant fixes.
Time Breakdown
| Section | Duration | Checkpoint |
|---|---|---|
| Quick Start | 15 min | 5 working prompts |
| Core Build: Part 1 | 15 min | 5 pattern prompts |
| Core Build: Part 2 | 15 min | 5 domain prompts |
| Core Build: Part 3 | 15 min | Template system + rubric |
| Domain Applications | 15 min | Real-world workflows |
| Extension Patterns | 10 min | Advanced techniques |
| Troubleshooting | 5 min | Problem-solving guide |
| Total | 90 min | 20-prompt library complete |
Ready to start building? Move on to the Quick Start section to create your first 5 prompts.
Prompt Engineering Mastery: Build Your 20-Prompt Library
Complete guide to creating production-ready AI prompts in 90 minutes - no prior experience needed
Quick Start: Build Your First 5 Prompts in 15 Minutes
Create production-ready prompts for summarization, research, code review, data analysis, and structured output