I’d been living and working in Sydney for a few months when a young journalist from the Financial Times in London showed up. She was to write a feature article on my experience there, particularly comparing British and Australian management styles.“Well,” I began, “in England we’ll discuss some new project for eighteen months or so, and there will be a really good reason when we decide not to go ahead with it. Now in Australia we’ll discuss it for about twenty minutes and decide to ‘give it a go’.”
I got into trouble with my boss in London over the article when it ran. “Unpatriotic,” he called it. It was certainly somewhat overstated, but the impulse behind it was, and remains, fundamentally true. “Give it a go” is an essential Australian expression, without an exact equivalent in English English.
The upside to a lengthy gestation period can be to reduce risk, aiming to get towards perfection. But the downside is that there’s often no chance in the meantime to see what will happen in real life – then to learn and adapt.
The advantage of the Aussie version is that things are tried out in practice with customers. And the problem can be that risks are not managed adequately.
Where am I on all this? In innovation, as in so many things, the perfect is the enemy of the good – and is often unachievable. So my advice is usually to give it a go.
Which culture do you live and work in?
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