Guest Post: Is Innovation Sharper in Seattle or Silicon Valley?

We think both Seattle and Silicon Valley are hotbeds of technological creativity. It’s not a winner-loser, either-or, single-elimination business tournament. Without both, the world would be far less prosperous and productive. There are big differences between The Emerald City and The Valley; but they just do things their own way.

We’ve picked up on five stereotypes that define the Seattle-Silicon Valley rivalry.

Soul on Ice: Silicon Valley is portrayed as a soulless, mechanistic place where monomaniacal technologists write software code 24 X 7. Seattle, meanwhile, is seen as an idyllic quality-of-life haven where hikers take precedence over hackers. Seattle is beautiful and offers a great work-life balance, but Jeff Bezos, Steve Ballmer, Howard Shultz and Bill Gates are not exactly unfocused disciples of John Muir. And Silicon Valley companies like You Tube, Facebook and Google aren’t exactly drone central.

There’s No "I" in Team: Silicon Valley is characterized as a highly indulgent environment for edgy individualists and hard-core iconoclasts who focus on the first-person singular. Seattle is described as if it were a Boy Scout camping trip. These are extremes. You don’t build the iPod or iPhone at Apple without an amazing group of talented people working together; and nobody ever called Microsoft mushy.

Built to Last, Built to Flash: Cynics say new companies come and go in Silicon Valley because venture-capital-rich firms are so heavily endowed they can take chances and back portfolio losers. The misnomer in Seattle is that most ground-up enterprises endure because there’s less financing and investment decisions are made more prudently. We believe the start-up cultures in Silicon Valley and Seattle both have hits and misses. And they’ve each spawned some great business successes.

Rebels Without a Cause: Everybody thinks it’s hard to retain top talent in Silicon Valley because the best people are always launching their own companies. The Valley celebrates free-style entrepreneurialism. But Seattle is no less entrepreneurial. New company formation here is less helter-skelter because former employees of mature companies like Microsoft or Amazon spin out in networks to quietly do their own thing.

School Daze: Located in the heart of Silicon Valley, Stanford is a huge part of The Valley’s success. But the University of Washington in Seattle shouldn’t be under-estimated. Indeed, UW has helped develop and launch 200 companies over the last 30 years.

Seattle and Silicon Valley always bicker over who’s the global champion of innovation. So which one is right?

Offer your thoughts in the comments below.
 

Jeff Hibbert (left) and Tom Taft (right) are managing partners of the Laurel Group, an executive search firm with offices in Seattle and Silicon Valley. Have a Hot Button issue for the TechFlash community? Write it up and send it with your name and contact information to techflashtips@bizjournals.com.