Cultural diferences

Image by Daaiquiri ™ via Flickr

I like to ramble a lot about differences in culture. In my opinion it's one of the main reasons for friction between European startups and American investors. I'll dive into more details later, but just as a taste, consider this.

We all know that some nations are better in doing some things than others. Granted, there is a lot of room for speculation and stereotypes, but still, there is a grain of truth in it. For example what do different nations excel at: French are best in cooking, we all admire German organization, and are fascinated by English politeness, Americans sell, and Italians are eternal romantics.

We all accept that and take it for granted. However consider now the world where traffic was handled by a French policemen, all salesmen were German, all great lovers were English, Americans would cook and Italians organize. Doesn't fit, right?

Yet somehow in the world of startups, we often ignore cultural differences and simply want to model every startup by the same template. Interesting, isn't it?

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