Prompt

For a phone assistant, the system prompt defines the role: how the assistant introduces itself, which tone it strikes, which questions it asks, what it must not promise and when it hands over to people. It is written once and applies to every call. What the caller says is something different; that is the input during the ongoing conversation.

Good prompts are specific and short. They describe procedures step by step, give examples for borderline cases and contain no contradictory rules. For the phone there is more: short sentences, one question per turn, numbers and times worded so they can be spoken. Changes to the prompt take effect on all calls immediately and should therefore be checked with test calls before going live.