Discovery Skills: Good Day/Bad Day (Typical/Better/Worse)

Purpose

To learn how to best support a person based on what needs to be present and absent in life.

Instructions

This is the single most powerful tool to learn about what is Important To people and how to best support them. There are a number of ways to learn about good day and bad days. For some people you can just ask and record what they say. For others, you may wish to break the day up into blocks of time (e.g. morning, before leaving the house, morning where you spend your day, etc) then walk through each block of time – going back and forth between the good scenario and the bad scenario through the timeline of a day, or various circumstances. For example,

“Tell me about a good morning. Tell me about a bad morning. Tell me about a good evening. Tell me about a bad evening. Etc.” Or ask, “What sort of things happen that contribute to a good day for you?”

If someone comments that they have no bad days, then ask about a ‘typical’ day or a specific Monday, Tuesday, etc. to get started.

Review the information to discover the simple and explicit things Important To someone, and the implicit items that are Important To but need to be revealed.