[vacuity]

You're right, but the key thing about description and prescription is that they aren't really separate. You constantly have to ask "does this work well here?", "should I replicate it there?", and so on. They deal with the same thing in different modes of interaction, and so being able to structure these analyses is important to doing each well.

[zdragnar]

You'd be surprised at how often seniors don't actually ask those questions when it comes to prescriptive standards. They get used first and questions only come up when it's too late.