Our People /

An engineering culture

Engineers solve problems; you don't have to be a computer scientist or have any particular degree to be an engineer. Engineers seek to build things, they believe that ideas should be evaluated on their merits, and they speak up when something isn’t right. We come together as a team to solve the world’s hardest data problems — we are all engineers.

MEET US

  • x

    Jimmy

    Kitchen Ops Palo Alto

    “My job is like orchestrating a symphony: it is challenging to feed everyone – and we are constantly getting more creative with our food. At the end of the day, people smile and say the food is great. It never gets old.”

    @PalantirTech
  • x

    Mike

    Forward Deployed Engineer International

    “When I first saw Palantir years ago, I had to ask, “How does the world not have this?!” I assumed it already existed because I thought I had seen it on TV. Palantir is leading the way to a future that’s been portrayed in media and science fiction for decades.”

    @shaferica
  • x

    James

    Forward Deployed Engineer London

    “It's easy to think that it's the perks that make Palantir a great place to work, but that's not it at all (although I'll never turn down free bagels). It's about sharing a common desire to solve difficult problems that really matter.”

    @PalantirTech
  • x

    Paul

    Forward Deployed Engineer New York

    “You spend half your waking hours at work, so it should be a conscious choice to be in an environment that’s doing something worthwhile. We’re a tight knit community of people who want to solve hard problems together.”

    @PalantirTech
  • x

    Amanda

    Recruiter Palo Alto

    “If you ask 10 different Forward Deployed Engineers what they do, you’ll get 10 different answers. There’s a huge opportunity to define your own development. Knowing that I’m a part of people thriving here feels awesome.”

    @PalantirTech
  • x

    Sar

    Admin Ops Palo Alto

    “It doesn't faze me anymore when I'm placing an order for nerf guns. But when engineers share anecdotes from clients saying that we’re helping save lives, that’s when I think, it’s amazing what we’re doing and I’m so grateful to be a part of it.”

  • x

    Robin

    Forward Deployed Engineer Palo Alto

    “As an FDE, I get to write code and interact with the customers who are using my products. That blend of engineering and business development has helped me grow in so many different ways.”

    @PalantirTech
  • x

    Mike

    Fellow D.C.

    “It’s one thing to have a group of smart people. But it’s another to have a group that is attacking critical problems with imagination and intensity. It’s as if we have a Special Forces team of computer scientists – they solve problems with focus, elegance, and intellectual heft.”

  • x

    Allie

    IT Desktop Support aka “Problem Squasher” Palo Alto

    “Coming to work every day and being able to make decisions for my team and implement them without any red tape is great. Plus, I get to use three computers at once and put up pink curtains in my office – and that’s awesome.”

    @allieontheweb


Want to spend more time with us?
Find us on Facebook, join the conversation on Quora or follow us on .

A different kind of company

A company founded and built by engineers is a company that obsessively builds works of measurable substance. We’re not working on a better advertising play or whatever. We build software from scratch that the world needs to solve its most difficult data problems.
We ship software that helps people change the world for the better.

We seek out problems at places that matter, and solve them like a ‘traditional’ software company—by shipping software that works. We don’t mine data. We don’t collect data. We don’t build one-off solutions. We craft technologies that solve entire classes of problems— some of which we haven’t even encountered yet.

We’ve built some neat stuff. We’re nowhere near done.

Our work to date is a fraction of the technology we have imagined. The process of transforming data problems into human-driven solutions is just that: a process, not a task to be completed. As the technology grows and evolves, so do the people and our company.

  1. The engineer as artist

    Small teams,
    unlimited imagination

    It's been said that “there are no leashes at Palantir,” and it's true. We work on flat, decentralized teams with decision-making authority, and our people have the freedom to creatively approach, own and solve problems. We've intentionally chosen this path over a traditional hierarchy, and it works much more often than not.

    At Palantir, engineers get to really spread their wings and act as architects, hackers, and artists. It's a fulfilling way to work—and to live.

The best idea wins

"There are no prima
donnas in engineering."

Freeman Dyson

If you have a great idea and the will to see it through, you can effect great change. Nothing is off limits—we’re constantly looking for improvements in our products, our process and in our people. All voices are equal here—we hire people to have an opinion and be creative. We’re intolerant of politicking, ego, and power brokers. If your idea makes the most sense, that’s what we’re doing, regardless of the seniority or role of the person presenting the idea.

Nothing is permanent

"Successful software
always gets changed."

Frederick P. Brooks

Sometimes opportunities are here today and gone tomorrow. Sometimes a breakthrough on an intractable problem invalidates our previous efforts. And yes, sometimes we make mistakes.

Inventing the future requires detaching yourself from the past. While we ship a couple of polished product families, we’re just getting started when it comes to building the full ecosystem of technology we’ve imagined.

We iterate obsessively on everything we do, always collecting new information about the right way to solve a problem. Existing components and processes are supplanted by new, better solutions as they become apparent. For those who built the thing being discarded, this is a cause for celebration not sadness. Replacement is viewed as success: we have now reached the next plateau of functionality and design and iteration begins anew. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Keep focused on
the mission

"The hardest single part of
building a software system is deciding precisely what to build."

Frederick P. Brooks, The Mythical Man Month

We view software as a means of effecting change in the world, not as an end unto itself. Our mission is to help our users, the people doing the hard work on complex, real-world problems. We do this by writing software that enables effective data analysis against complicated, data-driven problems.

Our work is incredibly complex, touching on computer science, data science, software engineering, public policy, good governance, large-scale distributed systems, user behavior, efficient use of resources... to name a few. It would be easy to get hyper-focused on some small aspect of this large universe and spend way too much time and resources on perfecting something that’s good enough already.

By always staying focused on the problems our users are trying solve, we clarify our own thinking about the right way forward.

Read more about our mission focus.