Is honest feedback something that you can ask from people, or, people cannot be taught how to do that? If somebody knows you, they usually will give you positive feedback to support your cause. If they don't know you, they are afraid of offending you, coming out as negative or simply have no interest in sharing what they really think.
Here is Andy Sack (Judy's Book) writing about his meeting with Brandon DeCuir of Divvy, and giving him some feedback that you usually don't find out in the wild:
"...
They're trying a local social networking application that allows people in a location to share
...
I'm not sure if either of these ideas is really a great idea for a business (I don't think I'd pursue either of them)
..."
Wow! Actually, I retract the "wow". Andy is like that. I wonder why other investors, advisors, entrepreneurs, friends, employees, managers are not more like that. Why is it so hard to tell somebody what you really think?
Entrepreneurs have tough skins. Be honest.
On the past few months, a lot of people has asked me for my opinion on their new product, or their conference/event, or the business idea. I pretty much always send a length email feedback. However, from time to time I'm caught by surprise in a lunch, or gathering and somebody tells me what they are working on and I can't believe how lame it is, but I don't know how to tell them.
I guess I haven't reached Andyness yet.
I'm the Co-founder & CTO of 
