Japan: To Fix Your Economy, Honor Your Failed Entrepreneurs
By Vivek Wadhwa

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This is something that Silicon Valley figured out long ago, and that is how it left other tech centers in the dust. Failure is regarded as a badge of honor, not as an object of shame. When you meet tech entrepreneurs in Palo Alto or Berkeley and ask them what they do, they typically tell you about their current startup; then they start showing off about all of their previous failures—because to have failed means to have gained experience and to have learned.

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The lesson that other regions need to learn from Silicon Valley is to glorify and embrace their failed entrepreneurs. Countries such as Germany, Japan, France, and India need to change their laws to allow high-tech companies to be started and shut down more easily. Their leaders need to work toward removing the stigma associated with failure. Their public needs to be educated to understand that, in the high-tech world at least, experimentation and risk-taking are the paths to success; that success is often preceded by one or more failures. This must be discussed frequently by political leaders and taught in schools. They should establish venture funds for entrepreneurs who are starting their second or third businesses after failing.

http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/17/japan-to-fix-your-economy-honor-your-fa...

Vivek Wadhwa is an entrepreneur turned academic. He is a Visiting Scholar at UC-Berkeley, Senior Research Associate at Harvard Law School and Director of Research at the Center for Entrepreneurship and Research Commercialization at Duke University.