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Relevance 10/10Training ParadigmsIntermediate8 min read

Supervised Fine-Tuning (SFT)

SFT trains models on high-quality human-curated instruction and response pairs.

Why it matters for annotators

Poor SFT examples directly reduce model quality and consistency.

Visual mental model

Instruction-response pairs -> model learns target behavior.

Examples (bad vs good)

Scenario: Real annotation scenario involving Supervised Fine-Tuning (SFT)

Bad: Labeling quickly without applying project rubric.

Good: Applying rubric criteria, documenting rationale, and escalating uncertainty.

Common mistakes

  • Skipping guideline details for edge cases.
  • Applying inconsistent criteria across similar samples.
  • Avoiding escalation even when uncertain.

Submission checklist

  • Read the latest guideline update before each batch.
  • Apply rubric dimensions explicitly in each decision.
  • Escalate ambiguous items with concise rationale.