Short Version:

Share the template below with your employees and encourage them to use it when they need to make their case for an idea they have that needs your validation or approval.

It is designed to help you evaluate the idea cleanly and provide actionable feedback to the employee who offered it.

Long Version:

You know what sucks? When you have an idea that you think is good, you tell your boss about it, and they reject it.

Smart, ambitious people (the kind we want working at small companies trying to do big things) typically have lots of ideas. They also tend to get very frustrated when those ideas are not adopted by their superiors.

When ideas are not adopted, it’s because the person in charge of green-lighting the idea was not convinced it was aligned well enough with the business. Period. Saying it was a “bad idea”

If you are “the boss” you want to:

• Encourage all your employees to proactively contribute ideas without fear of being (figuratively) kicked in the face

• Provide clear feedback on those ideas (whether the outcome is to move ahead or not)

If you are a smart, ambitious employee you want to:

• Get your points across cleanly (ie - in a concise, well-crafted way)

• Understand clearly where the idea falls out of alignment so you can learn

For some reason, this is typically very hard (on both sides of that table).

Hi Jane, 

Hope all is well and that your….

Wanted to share an idea I had. I’d love to discuss it in person if you have time this week but here’s a quick rundown: 

The problem I am trying to solve: 

Some important context: 

The options: 

My recommendation: