Routing Question
The domain's one-sentence diagnostic: did that happen once, or does it happen every time? A one-off disappointment points at this request or this conversation; the same defect in every output of the same kind points at the setup.
Exam context: The word every in a stem routes the diagnosis to the Project's instructions or knowledge, where the correction belongs once. The distractor rewrites today's prompt or hand-corrects the output again, paying the same cost forever.
See also: 7.1 Diagnosing and Resolving Underperforming Prompts and Poor Outputs
Context Starvation
By far the most common cause of a poor output: a request with no audience, no purpose and no source material can only produce generic output. The documented remedy is supply-side, giving as much context as possible, as if instructing someone with no background knowledge of the task.
Exam context: The fix supplies what was missing, never asks more forcefully. Emphasis, capitals and "make sure" lines feed a starved request nothing new.
See also: 7.1 Diagnosing and Resolving Underperforming Prompts and Poor Outputs
Instruction Overload
A request carrying a dozen requirements loses some of them. The documented remedy is structural: break complex requests into substeps, grouping and prioritising so the important requirements cannot sink.
Exam context: Re-sending the same list with the missed items in capitals is the classic distractor; it supplies nothing new, while the substep split is the keyed fix.
See also: 7.1 Diagnosing and Resolving Underperforming Prompts and Poor Outputs
Configuration Defect
A defect manufactured by the setup rather than by any single request: a Project's instructions or knowledge producing the same wrong tone, format or assumption in every output. Absences count too, such as a spelling or tone standard that was never stated.
Exam context: Recognising that the configuration needs changing is this domain's skill; writing the change is Domain 5's work. Stale knowledge files produce recurring defects just as instructions do.
See also: 7.1 Diagnosing and Resolving Underperforming Prompts and Poor Outputs
Degraded Conversation
A long chat that has accumulated superseded drafts, corrections that were later contradicted, and unrelated topics, all of it material Claude has to work with. The professional fix is a fresh conversation carrying a verified summary of what still matters.
Exam context: The documented costs are practical: the chat eventually hits its length limit, and longer conversations that trigger automatic context management consume more of the usage limit. No official source says long chats get slower or that Claude confuses topics.
See also: 7.1 Diagnosing and Resolving Underperforming Prompts and Poor Outputs
Named Failure Modes
The symptoms Anthropic's Help Center documents for this objective, each with its own fix. Incorrect or misleading responses, including fabricated quotes: scrutinise high-stakes claims and review cited sources. Hallucinated capability, such as claimed email sends and working-looking links that fail: Claude has no access to email or any software not explicitly integrated. Too-brief responses: retool the prompt, and give Claude the previous prompt and response.
Exam context: Half the diagnosis is recognising which documented symptom the stem describes, because each has a different fix. Chasing the delivery of an email Claude claims to have sent is the recurring distractor.
See also: 7.1 Diagnosing and Resolving Underperforming Prompts and Poor Outputs
Error Message
An operational notice, not a quality defect. A capacity notice means wait briefly and retry. A length-limit message means chunk the content, summarise key sections, or start a new conversation.
Exam context: The distractor treats the message as a quality problem and rewords the prompt, answering a question the system never asked.
See also: 7.1 Diagnosing and Resolving Underperforming Prompts and Poor Outputs
Escalation Reflex
Reaching for a more capable model or a higher effort setting because an output disappointed, before any cause has been named. A vague brief fails at every tier, so escalation buys the same generic answer, more thoroughly, at more cost.
Exam context: The domain's favourite trap. Escalation is legitimate only after the brief is sound, when the task genuinely needs depth (effort, extended thinking) or current outside information (web search, Research).
See also: 7.1 Diagnosing and Resolving Underperforming Prompts and Poor Outputs
One-Variable Adjustment
The discipline of changing exactly one thing per adjustment round, so that an improvement can be attributed, repeated deliberately, and explained to a colleague. The bundled alternative, changing the wording, the model and the example at once, produces a better draft nobody can learn from.
Exam context: The shotgun fix is dressed up as decisiveness in distractors. No Anthropic article teaches the one-variable method; it rests on the exam guide's objective wording and ordinary professional practice.
See also: 7.2 Adjusting Your Approach Based on Feedback and Results
Fixed Test Input
The same document, request and materials used for every adjustment round. When the input changes too, a better result may only mean an easier input, so the comparison teaches nothing.
Exam context: Editing an earlier message branches the chat, with artifacts of its own, so each round can be run from the same input and read against its predecessor. Testing the adjusted prompt on a different document and crediting the prompt is the planted error.
See also: 7.2 Adjusting Your Approach Based on Feedback and Results
Criterion Stated in Advance
A pass-or-fail sentence written before the new output is read: "an attendee can find the start time in five seconds", not "better". Stating it in advance stops judgement drifting towards whatever the new draft happens to do well.
Exam context: Judging by feel after the fact lets a round that fixed nothing get accepted. A returned draft plus a stated criterion identifies which requirement failed; "the manager didn't like it" identifies nothing.
See also: 7.2 Adjusting Your Approach Based on Feedback and Results
Third Failed Round
The stopping signal for adjustment: when several well-aimed rounds have not moved the output, the assumption that the approach is right has failed. The response is to go back to the cause list and re-diagnose, not to try a fourth round with slightly different words.
Exam context: The re-diagnosis may point at different source material, a feature such as web search or Research, a different setting, or work that should not be handed over at all.
See also: 7.2 Adjusting Your Approach Based on Feedback and Results
Measure First
The rule that optimisation starts from a number: about ten minutes of preamble, three or four times a week, justifies moving the preamble somewhere permanent, while a workflow that merely feels clunky justifies nothing yet except timing it.
Exam context: The presence of a real measurement separates the keyed optimisation from the unmeasured reorganisation offered as a distractor. Claim no saving you did not measure.
See also: 7.3 Optimising Workflows for Efficiency and Effectiveness
Repeated-Overhead Test
The placement question applied to anything typed, explained or attached at the start of every similar conversation: standing context and rules go in a Project's instructions, recurring reference material in Project knowledge, a near-identical weekly request in a saved form, and preferences that apply to everything at the account-wide personalisation level.
Exam context: Spotting which piece of a repeated preamble belongs at which level is the tested skill; writing the configuration is Domain 5's work.
See also: 7.3 Optimising Workflows for Efficiency and Effectiveness
Batching
Grouping multiple related tasks or questions in a single message rather than fragmenting them across exchanges, paired with being specific and concise so rounds of clarification never happen. A documented lever for saving both time and usage.
Exam context: Ten related questions sent as ten separate messages is the anti-pattern; fragmentation spends usage and scatters context that one fuller message would have kept together.
See also: 7.3 Optimising Workflows for Efficiency and Effectiveness
Well-Named Files
Files whose names state what each document contains, replacing versions, initials and abbreviations only their owner understands. In a large Project, retrieval decides which material Claude actually works from, and well-named files help Claude understand and retrieve the right information.
Exam context: Renaming for retrieval is a real optimisation with a documented mechanism, alongside referencing documents by name and grouping related documents in the same Project.
See also: 7.3 Optimising Workflows for Efficiency and Effectiveness
Proportion Rule
The recognition that some overhead is not worth removing: a twenty-minute task performed once a year earns no Project, saved form or afternoon of setup, because the arithmetic never pays back and the maintained artefact quietly goes stale between uses.
Exam context: In this domain's hardest items, deciding not to optimise, on the numbers, is the keyed behaviour. Count upkeep in the arithmetic, not just setup.
See also: 7.3 Optimising Workflows for Efficiency and Effectiveness