Hands-on session on "Prompt Engineering & Agentic AI

Abstract

The session commenced with an engaging icebreaker activity in which the speaker presented an image of six explorers standing before a puzzle, each holding only a fragment of the complete answer. This narrative effectively illustrated the essence of Prompt Engineering. Speaker then introduced the recipe for designing effective prompts. Students learned that clarity, context, and purpose are the fundamental ingredients of a high-quality prompt. An effective prompt clearly defines the role, task, objective, expected output, and tone while encouraging logical reasoning and creative thinking. These principles help ensure that AI-generated responses are relevant, accurate, and aligned with business objectives and stakeholder expectations. Participants were also introduced to several widely used prompting techniques. Zero-Shot Prompting demonstrated how AI performs tasks without prior examples, relying solely on its existing knowledge. Few-Shot Prompting showed how providing a few sample examples improves the quality and consistency of responses. Chain-of-Thought Prompting encouraged AI to reason through problems step by step, resulting in more logical and transparent outputs. Role-Play Prompting illustrated how assigning AI specific professional personas such as a business analyst, marketing manager, HR consultant, financial advisor, or software developer can generate context-specific and realistic solutions. These techniques highlighted how structured prompts transform AI into an effective collaborative partner for business decision-making.