[loarake]

I want to echo point #2 about listening rather than talking. When I first pitched my work to radiation therapy vendors at big conferences, I was expecting a kind of adversarial exchange to take place where I'd have to defend my software against cynical people trying to find its flaws, shark-tank style.

Instead I found that vendors were dying to tell me what they need and what's important for them. I quickly realised that the most important part after giving my pitch was to basically ask tons of questions about what they think is important and why. The vendors' answers were invaluable in honing my pitch for other vendors, but also to steer the direction of my project.

[stanleydrew]

This can be dangerous as well though. Most people aren't naturally adversarial and get uncomfortable pushing down paths where you don't know the answer or seem unprepared.

You often won't get someone to really challenge your assumptions unless they have some meaningful motivation. So you may have to listen in a different way than you're used to, or push people a bit to get them really comfortable with telling you things they might think you don't want to hear.