Weighted criteria
What
Weighted criteria is a thorough, systematic comparative method for ideas or draft solutions.
Why
Not all criteria are equally weighty. By including weighting in the assessment of the various criteria for ideas or draft solutions you can arrive at an overall score. This allows for more thorough and easier comparison.
How
- Identify the five to ten main criteria for assessing an idea or a draft solution.
- Allocate a weight in percentages to each criterion. The most important criterion gets the most weight – the highest percentage – whereas the least important one gets the least weight – the lowest percentage. The percentages should add up to 100.
- Create an assessment table, placing the criteria in rows and the ideas or draft solutions to be assessed in columns. Use the sample template if you wish.
- Assess the ideas or draft solutions on their expected performance for each criterion, from 1 (very poor) to 10 (excellent).
- Calculate the overall assessment for each draft solution by multiplying the assessment of each criterion by the weight or percentage accorded to this criterion and adding up the numbers you get.
- Reflect on the assessments. Is the idea or draft solution with the highest score in fact the best? Which other ideas or draft solutions score well, and why? Are there ideas or draft solutions that can be combined?
- Select the ones that score highest in other to develop them further.