This question was raised at one of my workshops last week: Must we praise mediocrity or failure? Must we congratulate kids when they lose a soccer game (lest we damage their self esteem)? Must we send kudos when a colleague botches a task or doesn't perform well in a given area (or does that risk unhappy employees)?

No.  Appreciative intelligence is not about pasting a label of "good" on something that isn't or denying that something doesn't work. It's not about telling someone something that isn't true.  You should not tell a child who fails a math quiz that they did a great job on the test.

Instead, it is about praising a child for being a good sport (if she has been one). It's about understanding that a kid might be a budding artist or brilliant language student instead of a mathematician, and that "story problems" or approaching math problems with his top skills or talent might help improve his math efforts.  It's about helping employees find situations in which they can apply their passions, talents and strengths. It's about appreciating what is valuable, useful, desirable or positive - not pretending something is there that isn't. It's about asking, "What is working or what will work?"