The United KingdomvsIsrael
イギリスとイスラエルUKIL
Seen from the United Kingdom: each line below describes Israel relative to the United Kingdom.
Culture Map: eight scales
Erin Meyer's eight scales, sorted by how far apart the United Kingdom and Israel sit, largest gap first.
Filled dot: the United Kingdom, where you are looking fromHollow ring: Israel
Where you will notice the difference5 scales
Evaluating
Israel gives negative feedback more directly than the United Kingdom (3 steps)
The United Kingdom 0, Israel −3, on a line from −3 (Direct negative feedback) to +3 (Indirect negative feedback).
Trusting
Israel builds trust through personal relationships more than the United Kingdom (3 steps)
The United Kingdom −2, Israel +1, on a line from −3 (Task-based) to +3 (Relationship-based).
Disagreeing
Israel is more willing to disagree openly than the United Kingdom (3 steps)
The United Kingdom 0, Israel −3, on a line from −3 (Confrontational) to +3 (Avoids confrontation).
Scheduling
Israel treats plans as more flexible than the United Kingdom (2 steps)
The United Kingdom −1, Israel +1, on a line from −3 (Linear time) to +3 (Flexible time).
Leading
Israel keeps less distance between boss and team than the United Kingdom (1 step)
The United Kingdom −1, Israel −2, on a line from −3 (Egalitarian) to +3 (Hierarchical).
Not placed3 scales
These scales are left unmarked: either Meyer leaves a country off the scale or no source places it, and drawing it anyway would be guessing.
- Communicating, Persuading, DecidingNo source places Israel on these scales
Hofstede: six dimensions
Scores from 0 to 100, sorted by the gap between the United Kingdom and Israel. They describe national averages, not either country's character.
Uncertainty avoidance
Israel scores 46 points higher than the United Kingdom (81 against 35)
The United Kingdom 35, Israel 81, on a line from 0 (Tolerant of ambiguity) to 100 (Avoids ambiguity).
Power distance
Israel scores 22 points lower than the United Kingdom (13 against 35)
The United Kingdom 35, Israel 13, on a line from 0 (Low power distance) to 100 (High power distance).
Individualism
Israel scores 20 points lower than the United Kingdom (56 against 76)
The United Kingdom 76, Israel 56, on a line from 0 (Collectivist) to 100 (Individualist).
Motivation towards achievement and success
Israel scores 19 points lower than the United Kingdom (47 against 66)
The United Kingdom 66, Israel 47, on a line from 0 (Consensus-oriented) to 100 (Decisive).
Long-term orientation
Israel scores 13 points lower than the United Kingdom (47 against 60)
The United Kingdom 60, Israel 47, on a line from 0 (Short-term) to 100 (Long-term).
- IndulgenceNo score for Israel
What the sources say, theme by theme
Entries for the United Kingdom and Israel, side by side on wide screens. Each keeps its own confidence label and citations.
Design & quality
United Kingdom3 claims
The GDS Government Design Principles (published 2012, updated 2025) include "Start with user needs," "Do less," and "Iterate. Then iterate again." Iterative development is an official principle of the public sector.
Well attested1 source2025gb-design-1
Point 8 of the GOV.UK Service Standard is "Iterate and improve frequently." It states that a service is never finished and that maintenance such as bug fixes is not enough.
Well attested1 sourcegb-design-2
According to a 2023 NAO report, there have been 11 cross-government digital strategies in the past 25 years. The Police National Computer, introduced in 1974, is still in use.
Well attested1 source2023gb-design-3
Israel3 claims
In Chutzpah (2019), Inbal Arieli argues in chapters such as "Failure Is an Option," "Certain Uncertainty" and "Resourcefulness" that growing up amid chaos (balagan) builds improvisation and resourcefulness. The argument is not based on quantitative data.
Thin1 source2019il-design-1
Hofstede's uncertainty avoidance (UAI) is high at 81. The Culture Factor describes a culture that wants rules, punctuality and precision, yet is good at improvising under pressure.
Attested1 source2026il-design-2
According to Haaretz (2012), rosh gadol ("big head") started out as an Israeli army term. It is praise for someone who sees the wider picture, takes responsibility and acts on their own initiative beyond their role.
Attested1 source2012Datedil-design-3
Failure & risk
United Kingdom4 claims
The GDS Way incident management standard requires incident reviews to follow a blameless post mortem culture.
Well attested1 sourcegb-failure-1
GOV.UK publishes incident reports, such as one on increased error rates on 5 January 2022. A former GDS staff member wrote in 2018 that publishing them builds trust and an atmosphere where people can learn safely.
Well attested2 sources2022gb-failure-2
In a 2019 blog post, the London fintech Monzo explained that it runs on-call with two people and records every incident. The Pragmatic Engineer warns against "blameless buck-passing," where blame is shifted while claiming to be blameless.
Well attested2 sources2019gb-failure-3
In the Post Office Horizon scandal, testimony that Horizon was "robust" was used despite bugs in the Fujitsu system, and more than 900 people were wrongly convicted. The Court of Appeal found that the Post Office had in effect reversed the burden of proof.
Attested2 sourcesgb-failure-4
Israel4 claims
Arieli argues that Israel is a society that does not shy away from risk and that children are raised to accept failure as part of learning. The Publishers Weekly review criticized the book for being unsure whether it is a parenting guide or a cultural analysis.
Thin1 source2019il-failure-1
After October 7, 2023, an estimated 15% to 20% of tech employees were mobilized for reserve duty, and in the war's third week about 70% of tech firms reported disruptions. Even so, the sector raised $3.1 billion in 220 rounds by spring 2024.
Attested2 sources2024il-failure-2
According to Calcalist, reserve duty delayed Wix's AI design product by one quarter, and Intel moved some work to teams in India.
Attested1 sourceil-failure-3
2025 brought a series of large acquisitions: Wiz ($32 billion, Google), CyberArk ($25 billion, Palo Alto Networks) and Armis ($7.75 billion, ServiceNow). Calcalist estimates the total value of acquisitions of Israeli-founded companies at about $80 billion.
Attested1 source2025il-failure-4
Feedback & code review
United Kingdom3 claims
Meyer writes that the British deliver negative feedback less directly than Americans and far less directly than the Dutch. She describes frequent understatement using downgraders such as "a bit" and "slightly."
Attested1 source2014Datedgb-feedback-1
The Anglo-Dutch translation guide that Meyer cites reads "With all due respect" as "I think you are wrong" and "Very interesting" as "I don't like it." The guide is half a joke, and its authorship is disputed.
Attested2 sources2014Datedgb-feedback-2
A study of 44,000 pull requests across 20 projects that compared acceptance rates with the developer's country HDI (Furtado et al., 2020) placed UK developers in the group with the highest acceptance rates.
Attested1 source2020gb-feedback-3
Israel3 claims
Dugri ("straight talk") is a language ideology that treats bluntness as a sign of courage and sincerity, studied by Tamar Katriel in a 1986 book. Katriel says dugri presupposes mutual trust.
Attested1 source2021il-feedback-1
Katriel describes dugri as the speech style of the European-origin Sabra generation of the 1940s and 1950s, in contrast to musayara, an indirect Arab style. In 1999 she herself noted that dugri was in decline.
Attested1 sourceil-feedback-2
On her Disagreeing scale, Meyer cites Israel as an example of a culture comfortable with open disagreement. A review of The Culture Map also places it among countries that give negative feedback directly.
Attested2 sourcesil-feedback-3
Hierarchy & decisions
United Kingdom3 claims
In Meyer's 2017 HBR chart, the United Kingdom sits in the same egalitarian and top-down quadrant as the United States, Canada, and Australia.
Attested1 source2017gb-hierarchy-1
In the public sector, the service assessment against the Service Standard acts as a de facto gate. According to DfE guidance, a service can fail its assessment if it does not publish new source code without a good reason.
Well attested1 sourcegb-hierarchy-2
The NAO (2023) identifies as a problem that many digital decisions in government are made by generalist leaders without technical expertise.
Well attested1 source2023gb-hierarchy-3
Israel3 claims
Hofstede's power distance (PDI) is 13, among the lowest in the world. The Culture Factor describes bosses as easy to approach and managers as relying on their team's expertise. A Culture Map review also puts Israel at the most egalitarian end of the Leading scale.
Attested2 sources2026il-hierarchy-1
Unit 8200 screens conscripts for math and programming aptitude and gives young soldiers difficult tasks with little supervision. The founders of Check Point, Palo Alto Networks, CyberArk, Wix and Wiz include alumni of the unit.
Attested2 sources2025il-hierarchy-2
Drop Site News has reported critically on the 8200 alumni network as a closed club and on the export of surveillance technology by firms such as NSO.
Attested1 sourceil-hierarchy-3
Communication & docs
United Kingdom3 claims
According to a book summary, the United Kingdom is on the low-context side of Meyer's Communicating scale but relies on context more than the United States, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands, and Germany.
Thin1 sourcegb-communication-1
"Make things open: it makes things better" is one of the government design principles, and publishing new source code is point 12 of the Service Standard. GDS explained the benefits of coding in the open in a 2017 blog post.
Well attested2 sources2017gb-communication-2
In 2015, Inside GOV.UK published a blog post describing what happens when something goes wrong on GOV.UK.
Well attested1 source2015Datedgb-communication-3
Israel2 claims
A review of The Culture Map classifies Israel as an unusual combination: high-context, yet direct with criticism.
Thin1 sourceil-communication-1
The share of private high-tech company employees working in Israel fell from 69% in 2019 to 62% in March 2026. Most of the rest work at overseas sites, mainly in the United States.
Attested1 source2026il-communication-2
Work & careers
United Kingdom4 claims
According to the ONS, full-time workers averaged 36.6 actual hours per week in 2024. The figure covers all occupations, not only engineers.
Well attested1 source2026gb-work-1
In the Stack Overflow Developer Survey 2025, 31.9% of UK respondents work fully remote and 25.8% work hybrid leaning flexible. Median salaries were $136,141 for engineering managers and $108,913 for back-end developers, about 60 to 70% of US levels.
Well attested1 source2025gb-work-2
Making 20 or more people redundant requires collective consultation. Consultation must start at least 30 days before the first dismissal for 20 to 99 redundancies, and at least 45 days before for 100 or more.
Well attested1 sourcegb-work-3
In a 2022 four-day week pilot (61 companies, about 2,900 employees), 56 companies continued afterward and 71% of employees reported less burnout. Most participants were small companies, and the pilot was not limited to tech.
Attested1 source2023gb-work-4
Israel3 claims
High-tech employed about 400,000 people in 2025, 11.4% of the employed workforce. Exports hit a record $85 billion, 58% of all exports. Employment grew 2.5%, well below the roughly 6% annual average of the previous decade.
Well attested2 sources2026il-work-1
R&D headcount fell by about 3,500 in 2025. According to the Israel Innovation Authority (2025), Israeli companies employ about 440,000 people abroad on top of the roughly 400,000 in Israel, and private companies keep about half of their R&D staff overseas.
Well attested2 sources2026il-work-2
The Adva Center criticizes the "Start-up Nation" image, noting that high-tech then employed no more than 8% of the workforce. It reports that 65% of high-tech employees are men and that they come disproportionately from top high schools, elite military units and leading universities.
Attested1 sourceil-work-3
Open source & community
United Kingdom3 claims
According to Octoverse 2024, the UK has more than 4 million developers on GitHub, up 19% year over year. Octoverse 2025 projects about 11 million by 2030.
Well attested2 sources2025gb-oss-1
- GitHub Octoverse 2024 (2024)
- GitHub Octoverse 2025 (2025)
An estimate by the industry body OpenUK (2023) attributes 27% of the UK tech sector's gross value added in 2022 to open source.
Attested1 source2023gb-oss-2
The public sector has made publishing code the default. The Skills Funding Agency reused GOV.UK's Smart Answers code and finished in under a week work that would otherwise have taken at least two months.
Well attested1 source2017gb-oss-3
Israel2 claims
Company-led open source includes Wix's Detox, an end-to-end testing framework for mobile apps with about 12,000 GitHub stars, and monday.com's design system Vibe.
Attested2 sources2026il-oss-1
- GitHub: wix/Detox (2026)
- GitHub: mondaycom/vibe (2026)
According to SecurityWeek, VCs with 8200 alumni such as Team8 and Cyberstarts invest in startups founded by fellow alumni, and money from exits flows back into new investments.
Attested1 sourceil-oss-2