In an article "Managing Your Manager", they also talked about this very situation. Their advice was to find a way to say No that the other party can accept it.

In my case, this meant to create a five page PowerPoint presentation. On the first page, I described the problem. On the next four pages, I presented possible solutions with pros and cons.

Interestingly enough, what I thought the best solution turned out to be inferiour to something else which I developed during the creation of the presentation!

In the end, I gave a ten minute presentation.

The managers in the room were so impressed with it that my prefered solution was accepted without any discussion. My solution, deemed impossible and inacceptable only days before, was implemented.

So I can fully support the advice I read somewhere: A manager is someone who decides but doesn't understand. A technician is someone who understands but can't decide. When the technician succeeds to explain the situation to the manager, the manager can make an educated decision instead and both will be happy.