PLANNED ‘MISTAKES’— Inside One of Australia’s Fastest Growing Start Ups. Part #2
Failure is The Only Option
Eucalyptus and A Culture of Planned Mistakes
At the genesis of Eucalyptus one of the stories that was shared with me from a founder when they were in a previous team that they ran was ‘F*ck Up Fridays’. It was not an archaic institutionalised company-sponsored bar crawl, but rather a weekly meeting dedicated to the mistakes that people had made and what they had learned.
The practice embedded a willingness to tolerate risk, and learn from failure which was, in this particular founder’s view, paramount to create a fast moving, and fast learning organisation. This was one of the guiding unwritten principles for how Euclayptus is run today.
The Difference Between Startup Land and Corporate Australia
One of the things most difficult in a high performing culture, especially one that is outgrowing the influence of the few people that started it, is preserving risk-taking.
Often you read about these types of statements in corporate/linked-in propaganda — a new exciting role that is looking for an ‘entrepreneurial mindset’, in a company that you know for a fact does not have risk-taking at it’s core.
The reason a lot of companies talk about this, and can’t do it, is that there is a great and distinct difference between corporate Australia, and start-up land. The board of Australian corporates are restrained by years of history, acres of sacred cows, and institutional shareholders who are not keen to see the boat rocked, let alone sunk to see if jetskis are a better option.
Australian corporate management teams are generally, the custodians of the business. In contrast, the management of start-ups are the custodians of capital — given to them specifically to grow at speed. A very different proposition. This means, without trying new things and trying them quickly you will be at a distinct disadvantage to other venture or growth capital enterprises.
Why Does it Even Matter?
The reason that risk taking is important is that a fast growing start-up heaves, creaks and groans under the weight of its yearned ambition. With extreme growth comes the requirement for heated debate and for people to bet on what they're seeing in real time. This is the only way you can grow.
At Eucalyptus despite risk-taking being in the cultural DNA of the business, It’s still evident that it is a daily battle against organizational inertia
It does not matter if Eucalyptus wants to be fast-learning and fast moving, it actually has to be.
Examples
I can share two great examples of what happened in the business where individuals have taken a stand on specific issues, and how it has shaped the businesses view of risk**.
- The first where the outcome was not so favourable for the person who promoted it, was congratulated publicly for the decision and the learnings that come from trying something new were shared in a broad forum
- The other, where a senior figure in the business went against the grain to great success, was publicly congratulated for taking a stand against other strong and senior views in the business — by the very person who disagreed
Without both, neither could have existed.
These two examples of win or grow were formative in shaping the company’s culture. It shows a culture where very smart people are able to say ‘I don’t know, but I’ll try this and find out’. They represent the very best of heated respectful debate, risk taking and most importantly celebrating and understanding the learnings from things not always go to planned.
The final step understanding why things did not go as planned, is the most important, because it creates a space where new people in the organisation can look at as examples and see that no great journey can be made without some failure, and that in fact to reach great heights, failure is a necessity.
I hope we can continue on this path as we grow because as a team scales, it becomes important to consistently refresh these examples to show it’s not just some writing in a notion doc somewhere, but an actual way of working, with precedent.
**For completeness the risks here only ever relate to strategy and never to patient outcomes, security or safety.