Affirming suggestions

Use affirmative judgment. Affirmative judgment is the process of looking for the best, rather than focusing on the worst and the negative, as criticism does.

Often the difference is in how you say something. Instead of saying, "That won't work," try "How can we use this so we can make it work in our system?"

Judge ideas and suggestions in a positive way using objective criteria, while looking for solutions rather than just problems. Involve participants in creating a list of key criteria that must be met for an idea to be successful. Use the list to help judge competing ideas. Generate options and refine the original suggestions and ideas to develop better ones.