Make Your Prompt Examples Agree With the Rule
An example can quietly contradict the instruction above it. The model then has two different versions of the job to follow.
For a ticket-routing prompt, write the routing rule and inspect every example against it. If “billing” includes refund requests, do not label one refund example as technical support without explaining the distinction. Use synthetic tickets so you can share the exercise safely.
Ask another person to label a few new cases using only the rule. Disagreement may reveal an unclear business decision rather than a model problem. Resolve that ambiguity before adding more examples. Keep the accepted examples in a test set so a later prompt edit cannot change the intended classification without a visible review.
