How direct you can be with feedback depends on context. Training and development relationships—coaching, mentoring, apprenticeship—license considerable directness because evaluation is their purpose. High-stakes situations may require directness because unclear feedback has serious consequences. Formal review contexts provide structure for feedback that might otherwise be difficult.
But social and collegial contexts require much more indirection. The relationship isn’t defined by evaluation, so direct criticism threatens the relationship itself. Learn to read what each context allows.
When you have a training or supervisory role, you likely have more license for direct feedback. When you’re peers or the relationship is primarily social, much more indirection is required. Misjudging this calibration—being too direct in social contexts or too indirect when clear feedback is needed—creates problems.
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