Before making your case, acknowledge the strongest points on the other side. This is not weakness—it is the single most effective structural technique in British persuasion.
When you say “you make a fair point about the timeline risk, and that is a genuine concern; however, the data suggests that…” you have done several things at once: demonstrated intellectual honesty, shown you have considered the full picture, reduced your audience’s defensiveness, and positioned yourself as a fair-minded evaluator rather than a one-sided advocate. British audiences are trained from school to expect engagement with counterarguments, and they mark down—consciously or unconsciously—anyone who appears to have ignored the opposing case. The stronger your acknowledgment of the other side, the more authority your own argument carries.
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