Well, I'm more used to the European side of things, so this is how I see it:
1 - Europeans, though are certainly enthusiastic, are not going to go for 80h/week workloads, not even as founders.
2 - Some sense of Naiveté in the European site, in part because of the less restrictive laws and stronger regulations (beats me how Soundcloud started in Germany, anyone who has tried to use Youtube there can relate - at the same time Soundcloud is "the exception that proves the rule")
3 - Less "hacking" spirit.
4 - A more stable social foundation "discouraging" entrepreneurship (debatable)
On the other hand, here's what I think Europe has to offer
1 - More opportunities to fill niches and offer new services
2 - Good education and people with a strong theoretical foundation
3 - Smaller costs than SV (and more affordable salaries, smaller healthcare costs)
4 - Easier to find talent amongst the whole EU, and easier to bring talent from outside (like Eastern Europe)
5 - Shorter distances between tech centers in Europe
> Europeans, though are certainly enthusiastic, are not going to go for 80h/week workloads, not even as founders.
I think it's more abstract. Europeans are much, much less likely to find understanding among friends and family for the idea of making sacrifice of any kind (of which long hours is only one kind) for "work".
Europeans are much less likely to understand the idea that a startup isn't "a job" and that starting your own business isn't just something you do to work from home, have less hours and (especially) not have a boss.
It's all on average and stereotyped, but it's definitely my feeling.
Also, it's just very, very suspect to want to get ahead. It's impolite to admit, but I can't help but think it's a damper om ambition, and with no ambition, there can be no Silicon Valley scale startups.
>I think it's more abstract. Europeans are much, much less likely to find understanding among friends and family for the idea of making sacrifice of any kind (of which long hours is only one kind) for "work".
Europeans are much less likely to understand the idea that a startup isn't "a job" and that starting your own business isn't just something you do to work from home, have less hours and (especially) not have a boss.
So, in essense, European don't believe in the gold-rush kind of startup culture. Seeing that only 1 in 100 or less companies ever make it, that's quite smart of them (well, us).
For the "less hacking spirit" somebody else said, I disagree. Heck, tons of hackers are from and in Europe (from Guido to the core KDE guys, and from projects like VLC and Haskell to OcamL).
> So, in essense, European don't believe in the gold-rush kind of startup culture. Seeing that only 1 in 100 or less companies ever make it, that's quite smart of them (well, us).
Depends on your definition of smart. I think we (again, on average and stereotyped) prefer the comfort of a stable and secure job, rather than taking a shot at a one in a hundred startup.
That's "smart" for the individual, but if no-one takes the shot, the hundred startups needed to get to the one that gets big doesn't get started.
The essence is that the modern western European culture isn't very conductive to risk-taking. This is great for stability and comfort, but it doesn't get us much progress and we will suffer in the long term for it.
Ambition is a big part of it, and European attitudes can be incomprehensible to Americans. I remember one discussion that ended with the statement, "the Belgians had ambition once and the Congo is still suffering for it".
As a foreigner observing Denmark (not sure about the rest of Europe), I think Danes are actually pretty ambitious, but often in a non-commercial way. It's definitely not cool to slack off and do nothing, so there is ambition in the sense that there's a strong cultural preference to better yourself, do interesting things, produce something. Even if you have a full-time day job, you're not "supposed" to just watch TV in your spare time, but should be an active member of an organization, have projects, something. But it's perfectly acceptable (perhaps even preferable) for your ambition not to be primarily about making money. In tech, for example, DIY hackerspace stuff, media art, nonprofits like Copenhagen Suborbitals, etc., all carry at least as much cachet as the startup sector does.
Yes, same in France, you can't be doing nothing but being explicitly looking after money is very much frowned upon.
Meanwhile in the US people are happy to use yearly income as the scale to compare people. Which is certainly wrong: any nurse should be higher on the scale than Columbian mafia bosses, right?
I think part of it is that in social position in large parts of Europe has come to be less dependent on money, and social welfare systems and strong labour movements driving salaries up have created a situation where there's less cultural pressure towards seeing money as a proxy for worth.
On the extreme end, there was a survey mentioned in Norwegian papers before christmas which stated that the majority of Norwegians believed they earned the equivalent of about $16,000/year more than they need.
That doesn't mean many wouldn't love to have more. But if you feel you're making $16,000/year more than you need, then it takes something other than money before you start taking big risks.
Of course Norway is an extreme given the income levels, but I feel that the general attitude of "having enough" or even more than you need is more prevalent in Europe - across income classes - than it seems to be in the US.
It's different from lack of ambition: Many of the same people who feel they have enough money, still want very much to reach some hard to reach goal. But choices can get very different if money isn't an important part of setting those goals.
While I understand this, remember that there are entrpreneurs, and then there is the subset of 'tech'. You won't find Richard Branson to fit the 'tech-startup' mold, but he's certainly an entrepreneur. And a pretty good one at that. Many, many people in europe privately fund all sorts of high-end businesses. They just don't use VC money and nor do they always go public. So the data have some variation of "survivorship bias", but in the sense that these data (ie, true survivors) are invisible if you are using a tech/ipo screen.
The only reason I mention this, is that its all-together quite likely that there are some very talented people out there, in europe, who will undoubtedly have what it takes to do what needs to be done.
The better explanation as to why silicon valley does not exist in europe, however, is just cultural. The US has NASA, Los Alamos, White Sands, Area-51, and all kinds of massive experience with science/industry and the types of invention and "productisation" of technology that comes from having huge deserts to play with expensive toys (rockets, weapons). That does not exist in europe, neither the culture, the money, nor the geography. And as a point of history, that to me is a better explanation of why silicon valley is where it is in terms of leading the commoditization of technology, and being the lynchpin a broader market.[#]
Tech entre-preneurialism is a sub-set of this market (ie, many SV firms are huge, or government centric). And thats why for tech-startups, you will always over-represent in SV, because of the larger ecosystem to which VC is a subset (of funding, to wall-street and the government...which underwirite BigCo tech still).
The other thing that is relevant is culture. But in a different way than it is often portrayed here. The ambition of many middle-class people is to strike it rich... "to live like a european". Obviously, this won't motivate europeans...for two reasons. The less obvious reason is lack of social mobility; the more obvious reason is the obvious one (ie, they are more worried about keeping a good thing going, than rebuilding a good thing from scratch).
This might not be a perfect explanation, but even as a straw man its worth considering that there is some truth in it.
[#] While the wealth and brains exist in europe, the critical-density of (capital, expertise, experimental sandbox) does not.
I was lucky enough to have toured both the european space facilities, and kennedy space center. The difference is that the european space program is focused on the science and engineering first, self-promotion a distant second. The ESA facilities were not centralized (i spent a week living in a bus to see most of them), and they weren't set up to handle tourists or journalists. The actual launches aren't even done from europe, so while i did see a live rocket test and the assembly hall for the ariane 5, these are not things which you can buy tickets to, and most of what the average citizen could buy tickets to was just ... bland. By contrast, KSC is a showroom first, it's set up to impress people, especially with things like the rocket garden, the vehicle assembly building, and what amounts to a theme park in the arrival area.
When you tally up the science and cost, both programs are probably very comparable, but the US program is much more approachable, because of a strong self-promotion mindset and a complete lack of self-awareness. Loud and proud. The ESA programs are much more low key, what pride there is must be carefully weened from between people's modesty.
I think the difference in the space programs is a reflection of the cultural difference caused by how the US was formed. The european culture has always valued knowing your place, and people who didn't want to stay in that place moved to the US. The US as a consequence values people who try to shout from the rooftops and reach for the sky.
NASA and Los Alamos are mostly played out, and White Sands is just a fun place to jump off sand dunes. This isn't to detract from the rest of your post, but the US isn't what it was, or all that you think it is.
"The US has NASA, Los Alamos, White Sands, Area-51, and all kinds of massive experience with science/industry and the types of invention and "productisation" of technology that comes from having huge deserts to play with expensive toys (rockets, weapons)." ... LHC? That is all.
While I don't disagree with this by any means, you are talking an incredibly specialized asset in the LHC. The difference is that Silicon Valley was not built to play with <particular> specialized assets, so much as it was built to <develop specialized assets> to play with in general. In that regards, it was built to make toys to put in 'the sandbox'. In this view, having a sandbox to play in is quite useful. Not only is it motivating, but its "open plan" facilitates a broad imagination for useful experiments. Rather than a single-framework of experiment designed for a singular and very specialized asset.
Speaking as someone who has lived and worked extensibly in all three (US, Britain,"Europe") I would argue that Britain is certainly closer to the rest of Europe than it is to the US.
I live in Sweden now, the organisation I work for is in the Netherlands, I have relatives in Switzerland and in Spain. The way society is structured in all of the EU countries I have visited or lived in are way closer to each other than to the US, including Britain IMHO.
"Ambition is a big part of it, and European attitudes can be incomprehensible to Americans."
What attitude are you referring too? do you have any objective fact that would prove that europeans are less ambitious than americans?
If you go to any selective European school or university, students are certainly as ambitious as their american counterparts and aren't afraid of working hard to achieve their goals.
However, they are probably more interested in an executive position in the finance industry than founding a company, which doesn't sound unreasonable.
About the ambition aspect, it's not so much as "dampened" but also a dose of "they don't see a point in too much ambition" or of "doing it just to be n. 1", and they certainly want to reach the top, but enjoying the ride as well.
Yes - the general culture in the Netherlands is that being successful is great, but trying to be successful is naive until you have anything to show for it. And if you are successful, you better be modest - arrogance is widely looked down upon.
Neglecting work/life balance is looked down upon, too.
I'm sure some European founders have interesting stories to tell about that time when they "came out" as ambitious :)
EDIT: I just realised the difference is probably in the "forward thinking" culture of the USA vs. the "living in the now" culture here. If you aren't successful now, why worry about success?
>> "1 - Europeans, though are certainly enthusiastic, are not going to go for 80h/week workloads, not even as founders."
This assumes that to be successful startups need to be working 80h/weeks. There are plenty of successful tech companies working much less than that. Treehouse for example works a 4 day week. Long hours are important when building the MVP and getting it out but after that I think you can work normal hours.
>> "4 - A more stable social foundation "discouraging" entrepreneurship (debatable)"
Doesn't this encourage entrepreneurship? It enables you to take the risk without fear of ending up homeless. For example if I were to start a new company there are programs I can sign up for which would give me £60 per week for 6 months + I believe I would still qualify for housing assistance (basically my rent would be paid for me). So as a single guy I could easily bootstrap a company with little-no risk.
"This assumes that to be successful startups need to be working 80h/weeks."
You are correct, and I don't assume it. But several people do.
"Doesn't this encourage entrepreneurship? It enables you to take the risk without fear of ending up homeless"
Yes, there are two sides to it.
Edit: I'll reply here why does this discourage entrepreneurship and my fault for not making this obvious
The sentiment of "failing at business" as a failure is much stronger. Yes, you won't end up homeless, but it doesn't mean the society (and the people close to you) "accepts" what happened.
Because you went for "computer stuff nonsense" instead of going for a traditional job.
The way this relates to the welfare structure is in their "origin" of having everything nice and square and predictable.
OP basically says people in Europe look at you weird for starting a business. Failing the business afterward is a social tragedy.
It's about social/peer pressure.
Having lived in many countries across Europe, I can attest. Some countries are worse than others of course (the worst being the ex-commie/socialist ones).
My experience was different. Failing the business is a social tragedy only if you took too much debt. If you simply find a job afterwards, then it is ok. At least among my friends.
Europe is ~800million people with very different cultures. You can find geniuses here. You can find entrepreneurs. You can also find people that are sloppy. You can find people that have built billion dollar tech companies. Stop generalizing.
>Europe is ~800million people with very different cultures. You can find geniuses here. You can find entrepreneurs. You can also find people that are sloppy. You can find people that have built billion dollar tech companies.
But you can't find a Silicon Valley or a similar economic and/or cultural spot. He's trying to explain why.
>Stop generalizing
Generalizing is the (literal and historical) start of science -- putting things in general categories and taxonomies is essential in understanding them.
There are categories of things -- and different places have different characteristics in aggregate, not just because "there are various kinds of people in general".
Nobody is saying that generalizing is wrong in the general sense. It's just that sometimes advantages can be had to being particular. For example, I have a feeling that the culture in Estonia (including one's attitudes towards entrepreneurship) is quite different from the culture in France.
I think what the post is trying to say, if you look at Earth, you'd say, look at those bunch of whiners, on average they don't do squat. I mean most of them are just plagiarizing and barely make ends meet. Or just starving to death...
Taken into average VC spirit is pretty dead in most places on Earth. Can VC in Africa, India and China be compared to USA?
USA shares common history, language, state system. Europe is waaay more diverse. Treating it like a singular entity is much like treating all human states on Earth as a single entity.
> But maybe my experience living, working and studying in 3 different countries in the EU is worth nothing.
I'm not really impressed, given how wide strokes you painted. I just think it's more constructive to at least state the countries you're talking about rather than just the continent that they share.
Austria
Belgium
Bulgaria
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Denmark
Estonia
Finland
Greece
Hungary
Italy
Latvia
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Malta
Netherlands
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Slovakia
Slovenia
Spain
Sweden
United Kingdom
I for one think it's amazing that I see so many globetrotters (well, continent-trotters) that have experienced and gotten to know so many different European cultures. At least that's the kind of credentials that I assume when they talk about Europe as one homogeneous group of people...
Some of the things you mention apply to subsets of Europe, but not all of them. With more than 50 countries, the cultures, work habits, legislations and economic levels are very different all around. Romania and Sweden, Estonia and France, Finland and Portugal, UK and Russia - yes, Russia, or Ukraine - are vastly different when compared on all the points. Even inside each country and age group people work and act differently. So many young founders all across those 50+ countries put in 80+ hour workweeks, hack or never mind the local legislative restrictions. They feel and act much more as a part of Silicon Valley than the economy and local culture their parents and non-tech friends share.
> 2 - Some sense of Naiveté in the European site, in part because of the less restrictive laws and stronger regulations (beats me how Soundcloud started in Germany, anyone who has tried to use Youtube there can relate - at the same time Soundcloud is "the exception that proves the rule")
SoundCloud actually started in Stockholm and moved to Berlin. Maybe because of the music scene there.
> 3 - Less "hacking" spirit.
I can only talk about Sweden, and I certainly think there's a culture like that here. Lots of old demo coders, etc. Probably one reason why there are quite a few game companies.
As I see it, the startup scene is real and has the same kind of "glorification" here, maybe because of the country's past with entrepreneurs and large companies. Or maybe because of success stories like Minecraft, Spotify, Skype, etc. People will certainly not look down on you for going your own path. What's lacking though are VCs willing to spend money, I think it's harder to get funding.
1. There are a large number of Europeans working 80h/week workloads at investment banks, private equity firms etc.
Many go into these roles from graduate school and I can't think of any that match Stanford etc in entrepreneurial spirit. Intriguingly enough, although grad school is a fraction of the cost of the US, expectations that one should go into an "established" firm after are, if anything, even higher
2. In the UK at least laws and regulations are in many cases better than the US, certainly from a tax perspective
On #1, I will say that the finance and consulting people I know in Europe (particularly Germany, Switzerland, and the UK) seem to work just as hard as their U.S. counterparts. I don't see why entrepreneurship can't be the same.
> 1 - Europeans, though are certainly enthusiastic, are not going to go for 80h/week workloads, not even as founders.
First of all, yes, we do. Been there, done that. That said, I don't think it is/was beneficial - I've had to send people home to rest because they became a net drain on the team.
I think your points are highly dependent on where in Europe - I don't recognize myself in any of your top four points.
Isnt working 80 hours a week ineffective due to you being tired soon and burned out after few years? Assuming that really work those 80 hours instead of chatting, browsing or mindlessly staring into screen.
I read some studies about that. Maybe I believe them cause I am European. Or maybe cause I did worked a lot in the past and my experience confirmed studies.
If you put those 80 hours/week into a high-growth startup that takes off, a few years are all you need. After that, the expectation is that you'll be a multi-millionaire and can practically retire.
Without making any specific claims or predictions, I think it's reasonable to assume that expanding the EU's areas of free movement (eg Romania and Bulgaria a few weeks ago) opens up new opportunities, in labour/talent markets for sure.
> 2 - Some sense of Naiveté in the European site, in part because of the less restrictive laws and stronger regulations (beats me how Soundcloud started in Germany, anyone who has tried to use Youtube there can relate - at the same time Soundcloud is "the exception that proves the rule")
It proves (tests) the rule and the rule doesn't hold for them, which is an argument against the general validity of the rule. I don't understand why you write "at the same time..." because then it looks like the fact that it proves a rule is in fact an argument for the general validity of the rule.
1 - Europeans, though are certainly enthusiastic, are not going to go for 80h/week workloads, not even as founders.
2 - Some sense of Naiveté in the European site, in part because of the less restrictive laws and stronger regulations (beats me how Soundcloud started in Germany, anyone who has tried to use Youtube there can relate - at the same time Soundcloud is "the exception that proves the rule")
3 - Less "hacking" spirit.
4 - A more stable social foundation "discouraging" entrepreneurship (debatable)
On the other hand, here's what I think Europe has to offer
1 - More opportunities to fill niches and offer new services
2 - Good education and people with a strong theoretical foundation
3 - Smaller costs than SV (and more affordable salaries, smaller healthcare costs)
4 - Easier to find talent amongst the whole EU, and easier to bring talent from outside (like Eastern Europe)
5 - Shorter distances between tech centers in Europe