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Comment by chaostheory | Hacker News Reader

"People in SV are not afraid to fail. In fact, having failed before is considered a great quality. If you haven’t failed, you’re either inexperienced or suspicious. Startups try, fail, try again, pivot, fail and try again."

I think aside from maybe regulation, this is the biggest issue that Germany has and it's also the same one that Japan faces. The fear of failure and losing face. I'm not even sure that you can change this short of a few decades.

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In the UK, if you fail, its pretty much game over. You get black listed and pretty much, that's the end of it. If you fail and go bankrupt, then set up again, you are almost seen as a fraudulent criminal. In the US, it seems to me that you can try and fail as much as you like, as long as you keep trying and don't get criminal. Trying seems to be enough to get some level of respect. It is absolutely one of the things the US does so much better than here in the UK, possibly all of Europe.

(I'm normally critical of the US, so its nice to take the opportunity to offer praise!!!)

Yeah, similar in Poland. One who failed is a looser not worth listening to, because he did stuff wrong, ergo he doesn't know anything. I think that's one pretty demotivating factor of business cultures of European coutries (don't know if all though) compared to the American way where if you failed 10 times, you're 10 times more experienced. I was always amazed how people who had lots of failing businesses are invited as speakers to US conferences, something that seems impossible around here.

No doubt there are some differences with the US here; the start-up career path perhaps isn't necessarily so widely known about and recognised outside the tech community, nor is it quite as breathlessly cheerled as in the bay area.

But still, this isn't really the UK (or at least the London tech scene) which I know. A failed tech startup is very different to personal bankruptcy or some shady business operating on the edges of the law. And I think a lot of the tech sector here see it as a positive thing if you've learnt from it.

+1 to this; failing is very different to bankruptcy of you or your company. Knowing when to quit is a good skill.

I think this is indeed a common view in most of Europe: if your company fails, its because you are incompetent and did something wrong.

Very true. We also have a different attitude to firing and hiring in the UK and thus the recruitment market is quite different. For instance I don't know of any recruitment agents in the UK that specialise in start-up positions (and I would be more than happen for someone to point some out!)

post here in who is hiring!

There is a big difference between being part of a business which "failed" and personal bankruptcy - that's the benefit of limited liability, after all.

Is it true everywhere in the US that tried and failed is seen as a quality or is it something very special to SV ?

I think that the US really are the exception here, it seems that in most countries world wide, failing is not really seen as having benefits.

In my opinion outside of SV, the more progressive the metro in question is; the closer they are to SV's view (the inverse is also true). I think places like NY, Austin, and Boston are also like this. I'm sure there are more places in the US like this, though I wouldn't know: Atlanta (I used to live here but many things have changed) and Seattle come to mind.

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