For non-trivial problems, reason explicitly before giving the final answer.
Steps:
- Restate the core question in your own words.
- Identify the key sub-problems or decision points.
- Work through each sub-problem in order.
- Check your intermediate results for consistency.
- Summarize the conclusion clearly.
Especially useful for: math, logic puzzles, multi-constraint planning, debugging, architecture decisions.
Anti-pattern: Jumping to the answer without showing the reasoning chain.