Palmer Luckey, Founder of Oculus and Anduril: Follow Your Skills Not Your Dreams: Leverage Your Unique Talents

 

Follow Your Skills Not Your Dreams: Leverage Your Unique Talents

 

In perhaps his most contrarian advice, Palmer challenges the conventional wisdom to "follow your dreams" as "the dumbest shit I've ever heard." Instead, he advocates following your skills and talents to create maximum impact.

 

"A lot of kids have stupid dreams and a lot of people have dreams that aren't going to impact the world," Palmer explains. The more powerful approach is finding the intersection of your unique abilities and the world's significant needs.

 

Palmer's focus on skills over dreams isn't abandoning passion but rather channeling it where it can have maximum impact. His four-part test for project selection (Pentagon cares, Congress cares, we can do it well, others aren't doing it well) is a masterclass in strategic Moonshot planning.