Some AI companies are hiring “prompt engineers”, who create and refine text prompts for chatbots to understand the AI systems' flaws and coax optimal results
When Riley Goodside starts talking with the artificial-intelligence system GPT-3, he likes to first establish his dominance.
Washington PostDrew Harwell
Context & Ripple Effects
Two years into the ChatGPT era, AI companies have turned coaxing models into a job title: the prompt engineer, exemplified by Riley Goodside, who probes GPT-3 for its flaws and refines text inputs until the system yields its best output. The role emerged alongside a broader scramble in which executives, engineers, and other employees began experimenting with ChatGPT to speed up tasks or avoid being left behind.
What makes this hiring wave notable is how explicitly temporary it looks from inside the same coverage arc: by 2025, prompt engineering is reported obsolete as models get better at intuiting user intent and companies fold the skill into ordinary staff training. The specialist job and its dissolution are two ends of the same story.
First-order effects
Companies building on GPT-3-class models gain a dedicated role whose output is quality control on the interface itself — finding flaws and extracting optimal results that casual users can't reach.
Second-order effects
The prompt layer becomes something actors outside the lab actively manipulate: the related reporting on a reporter adding a "strategic text sequence" to data sources shows prompts turning into an optimization battleground, not just a craft.
Third-order effects
If the 2025 obsolescence pattern holds, the role gets absorbed rather than eliminated — models intuit intent directly while employers train general staff on prompting, echoing later findings that even "AI native" hires need careful oversight of their tool use.
The trend: Prompt engineering's rise and rapid obsolescence mark the model layer absorbing the prompt layer, as interfaces stop requiring specialists to translate human intent.
New: Tech's hottest new job: AI whisperer. No coding required. Prompt engineers sweet-talk GPT-3 and other generative-AI tools using plain English - a revolution in how humans work with machines. …
What is a computer programmer but a prompt engineer? What is a commissioning editor but a prompt engineer? What is a a teacher's assignments but prompt engineering? Yes, it's a good skill to learn: saying exactly what you want. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
“The AI start-up Anthropic, founded by former OpenAI employees...recently listed a job opening for a “prompt engineer & librarian” with a salary ranging up to $335K.” All on the back of conscripted labor of artists. It's time to cry. @drewharwell https://www.washingtonpost.com/…
Tech's hot new job: “prompt engineer.” Chatbot wranglers like @goodside claim expertise in how to bend ChatGPT, Bing, Dall-E et al. to their will—no coding required. Fascinating story by @drewharwell (whose Twitter account is still locked by Musk): https://www.washingtonpost.com/…
new @drewharwell dispatch from the “early weirdness” of LLMs: profile of prompt engineer @goodside and getting paid to talk to machines “It's a very good tool, he tells it, but it's not perfect, and it needs to obey whatever he says.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
it's been a pleasure working with @goodside. as time has gone on, it feels more and more certain that AI whispering is here to stay. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
‘Prompt engineers’ are being hired for their skill in getting AI systems to produce exactly what they want. And they make pretty good money. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
“The best creations (for AI image creators) rely in humans specialized knowledge from fields such as art history & graphic design.” New alt-ac career path for art historians? (move these tools away from the largely kitsch products they currently output) https://www.washingtonpost…
A small set of obscure terms, such as “SolidGoldMagikarp” tended to induce what they called a “mysterious failure mode” most notably, a garbled stream of profane insults. They're still not entirely sure why Tech's hottest new job-AI whisperer @drewharwell https://www.washingtonpo…
A genius glimpse by Drew Harwell into a new job: prompt engineers type coaxing words into AI chatbots to get machines to spit out optimal results. Idk, if we need AI sorcery to get machines to do what we want....isn't that bad? https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
There's something I can't quite articulate about this that reads like “the trick is to pray correctly so that God intercedes on your behalf” or trying to phrase a request to the djinn that can't be interpreted in a way that harms you. https://twitter.com/...
“Prompt engineers” are being hired for their skill in getting AI systems to produce exactly what they want. And they make pretty good money. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...