Prompt Engineering Cheatsheet

In the age of generative AI, prompt writing has become a core engineering skill. Whether building a chatbot, generating code, or designing autonomous agents, the prompt is your most powerful interface with a Large Language Model (LLM).

This post distills the key ideas from Lee Boonstra’s excellent “Prompt Engineering” (Google Cloud) whitepaper, adding my structure and visuals to offer you a practical cheat sheet and mind map. It’s ideal for AI developers, product engineers, and anyone working with LLMs.

Prompt engineering isn’t just writing instructions — it’s an iterative, analytical, and creative process. Techniques like Chain of Thought, ReAct, or Step-Back Prompting push LLMs beyond surface-level output and unlock deeper reasoning, precision, and control.

The Cheatsheet