Edit for One Problem Per Pass

An editing workflow that runs the draft through Claude one concern at a time — structure, then clarity, then tone, then proofreading — instead of asking it to 'make this better' in a single sweep. Each pass has exactly one job.

'Improve this' asks the model to trade off a dozen dimensions at once, and it tends to rewrite everything, dragging in changes you didn't want and smoothing away your voice. A single-focus pass is reviewable — you can see exactly what changed and why — and it composes: a structural edit followed by a clarity edit lands better than one blended attempt, the same way human editors work in passes.

Anything you care about — an important email, an article, a proposal — where you want control over what changes and why, not a wholesale rewrite.

Rough drafts you're happy to have fully rewritten, or low-stakes text where one quick 'tidy this up' is enough. Don't run four passes on a Slack message.

We'll edit this in separate passes. This pass only: <structure | clarity | tone | proofreading>. Change nothing outside that concern. Show me what you changed and why, and leave my voice intact.

<draft>

On an article, the structure pass reorders two sections and cuts a redundant one; you approve, then the clarity pass tightens sentences without touching the new structure — you see and control each change instead of getting an unrecognisable rewrite back.

Before the passes, ask Claude for a one-paragraph editorial diagnosis — what's working, what's weakest — and let that triage which passes the draft actually needs. A tight draft might only need clarity and proof.

• Asking for everything at once and losing your voice to a total rewrite.
• Not reviewing between passes, so a bad structural change contaminates the later ones.
• Running every pass on text that only needed a quick proofread.