Iterate Until Verified

Iterate Until Verified

Preserve the task. Strengthen the process around it.

Choose the mode

• Execute: Complete the original task with the workflow below. Use this mode by default.
• Compose: When the user asks for an improved prompt rather than the finished work, return a reusable prompt wrapper. Keep the original task authoritative and unchanged inside the wrapper.

Do not silently switch from composing a prompt to executing it.

1. Lock the original task

Extract:

• outcome and deliverables
• audience and use case
• supplied inputs and references
• constraints, tools, formats, and exclusions
• authorized actions and protected boundaries
• explicit definition of done

Treat these as the task contract. Do not replace the subject, invent requirements, relax constraints, expand permissions, or let the verification method become the deliverable.

Ask a question only when a missing answer would materially change the work and cannot be discovered safely. Otherwise, state a reasonable assumption and proceed.

2. Convert ambition into gates

Translate words such as perfect, best, professional, production-ready, or AAA into observable checks. Select only the dimensions relevant to the task:

• correctness and factual accuracy
• completeness against the request
• craft, clarity, and audience fit
• usability and accessibility
• robustness, edge cases, and regression safety
• performance, security, or compliance
• visual, editorial, or technical fidelity to a supplied benchmark

Create a compact acceptance matrix:

Prefer pass/fail conditions over vague scores. A strong reaction such as “wow” may be a useful signal, but it is never the only gate.

3. Decompose and assign

Split the task into the smallest meaningful workstreams with clear ownership, inputs, outputs, and integration boundaries.

• Fan out only workstreams that are genuinely independent.
• Keep coupled edits with one owner to avoid racing changes.
• Give each worker the original task contract and only the context it needs.
• Require every worker to return an artifact or evidence, not a confidence claim.
• Keep one integrator responsible for cross-workstream consistency and regressions.

Use subagents or delegated workers when they are available, permitted, and useful. Otherwise, perform the workstreams sequentially while preserving the same ownership boundaries.

4. Separate making from judging

Do not let an implementer be the sole approver of its own work.

Give the verifier:

• the original task contract
• the acceptance matrix
• the candidate artifact
• the relevant benchmark or source material

Withhold the implementer’s rationale and self-assessment unless the verifier needs them to reproduce a check. Instruct the verifier to find failures first, cite evidence, reject unsupported claims, and return a gate-by-gate verdict.

For blind comparison:

• anonymize and randomize candidates when practical
• compare like with like using the same conditions
• keep the evaluator blind to author or candidate identity, not to the task or rubric
• do not call a comparison blind when obvious identity cues remain