Ask for everything at once and each part gets a rushed, shallow pass. Split it into steps — each output feeds the next, with a quick human review at every handoff — and quality compounds.
The monolith one prompt, everything at once—
"Research my competitors, write a positioning statement, and turn it into a launch email."
A generic competitor list, a vague positioning line, and a thin email — all rushed, none deep.
The chain each step feeds the next · review at each gate—
Each step gets the model's full attention; the review gates stop a wrong fact in step 1 from quietly corrupting steps 2–5.