Start with praise and honest opinion.
So which is it?
Seriously though, I hate it when people throw in some praise completely unrelated to the thing we are talking about at the moment in an attempt to soften the criticism. It just seems really transparent and fake to me. Praise people for things when they are doing them, not as sugarcoating for your criticism. That just devalues the praise and your criticism. But maybe that’s just my stereotypical German directness.
No, MareOfNights, I also find that weird.