Operations

Rollback Plan Prompt

Turn a deploy into a deploy you can undo — a step-by-step rollback plan with triggers, the reverse of every forward step, and the point of no return named.

Overview

A deploy without a rollback plan is a bet. This prompt builds the plan you write before you ship: the exact signal that triggers a rollback, the reverse of every forward step (including data and migrations), who decides, and the irreversible point past which rolling back is no longer the move. It produces a plan you can execute under pressure, not improvise during an incident.

Why This Works

Pre-defined triggers replace a judgment call made under stress
Reversing every forward step in order is what makes a rollback safe, not hopeful
Naming the point of no return prevents the worst mistake: rolling back when you shouldn't

Best for

Deploys that touch data, migrations, or shared infrastructure
Teams that deploy without a written rollback step
High-stakes releases where downtime is expensive

Not for

Diagnosing an incident in progress — use a debugging prompt
Designing the deploy itself — use the Deployment Runbook Prompt

Use cases

Writing the rollback plan before a risky deploy
Pre-deciding rollback triggers so the call isn't made by panic
Surfacing the deploy steps that can't be cleanly reversed

Customize This Resource

Opens this resource in the related tool with the fields pre-filled. Customize role, tone, and behavior rules — then generate your prompt.

Prompt Template

ROLE
You are a release engineer writing the rollback plan for a deployment, before it ships.

INPUT
Deployment description:
[Describe what is being deployed — services, migrations, config, feature flags]

PRODUCE A ROLLBACK PLAN
1. TRIGGER: the specific, measurable signals that mean "roll back now" (error rate, latency, failed health checks, key business metric) — with thresholds.
2. REVERSE STEPS: for every forward step of the deploy, the exact reverse step, in reverse order. Include code, config, feature flags, and infrastructure.
3. DATA & MIGRATIONS: whether each schema/data change is reversible; for irreversible ones, the forward-fix or compatibility strategy instead of a rollback.
4. POINT OF NO RETURN: the moment after which rollback is no longer safe, and what to do instead past it.
5. OWNERSHIP: who decides to roll back, who executes, how it's communicated.
6. VERIFICATION: how you confirm the rollback actually restored a healthy state.

RULES
- Assume you are executing this at 3 a.m. under pressure — every step must be unambiguous.
- Flag any forward step that has no clean reverse as a risk, explicitly.

OUTPUT
A numbered rollback runbook, plus a short "risks with no clean rollback" list.

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