In bureaucratic systems like the military, real innovation rarely comes from within the machine-it’s driven by heretics. Shyam Sankar, Chief Technology Officer of Palantir Technologies, argues that history’s most impactful advances emerged from individuals who defied institutional norms.
“The only shit that ever worked were the things that the heretics actually did,” Sankar says. He draws a direct line between this contrarian spirit and modern entrepreneurship, noting that great founders share a “pathological obsession with winning.”
Sankar highlights Admiral Hyman Rickover’s nuclear submarine program as a lasting U.S. strategic edge. Built in the 1950s, its culture of excellence still underpins American naval dominance-particularly against China.
Delivering effective technology in defense or government, he adds, demands “disagreeableness.” Compromising to please bureaucracy often yields broken solutions. True effectiveness requires stubborn commitment to what actually works for the operator.
Europe, by contrast, hasn’t produced a single company worth over €100 billion from scratch in 50 years-an “astonishingly bad track record,” according to Sankar. The U.S., meanwhile, fosters human flourishing through cultural support for individual potential, belief in greatness, and what he calls “cultural plasticity”-the ability to adapt and learn.
“Believing that greatness is possible is a precondition to being able to express it,” he says. Likewise, recognizing one’s “superpower” and building environments where talent can be discovered-and tested-are essential for progress.