Spend enough time doing business in Israel, and you quickly realize that things work a little differently here. Plans are useful, but nobody expects them to survive reality unchanged. A meeting can become a pilot surprisingly quickly. When something does not work, the instinct is often to change it rather than spend months defending the original idea. From the outside, this can sometimes look chaotic. I believe that chaos is one of Israel’s greatest competitive advantages.
For decades, people have tried to explain the success of the Start-up Nation. Much has been written about the military, Israeli universities, and the development of a sophisticated venture capital industry. All have played an important role.
But after years of working with Israeli entrepreneurs and connecting them with global organizations, I believe there is another explanation: Israelis have become exceptionally good at building when the plan keeps changing.
For Israeli entrepreneurs, operating without certainty is not an abstract business concept. It is part of the environment in which companies are built. Israel’s domestic market is too small for most technology companies with global ambitions, so founders have to look abroad almost immediately.
At the same time, they are building from a country where reality can change overnight. In recent years, Israeli companies have dealt with a global pandemic followed by war, prolonged reserve duty, and significant disruption to international travel. Yet their customers did not disappear. Companies still had to deliver.
The result is a business culture with little patience for waiting until everything is perfect. When circumstances change, companies adjust and keep moving.
Wiz is perhaps one of the clearest recent examples. It was founded in 2020, when COVID-19 had suddenly transformed how organizations operated. As companies accelerated their move to the cloud, Wiz identified the security challenge that came with that transition and built for it at extraordinary speed. Five years later, Google agreed to acquire the company for $32 billion, completing the transaction in March 2026.
Of course, uncertainty did not make Wiz successful. Thousands of companies were founded during COVID, and most did not become Wiz. The more interesting point is that Israeli entrepreneurs are unusually accustomed to starting before the picture is complete. Adaptability doesn't begin when a crisis arrives. It is built into the way many Israeli companies operate from day one.
This matters far beyond Israel because it is exactly what many global corporations are struggling to achieve today.
Large organizations know they need to move faster. Technology is evolving so quickly that long-term planning is increasingly difficult, especially as artificial intelligence transforms entire industries. Yet large organizations are, by design, built around processes that provide stability. That is usually a strength. When it comes to innovation, that same structure can make experimentation painfully slow.
This is where Israel offers something much bigger than another pipeline of start-up.
For years, global companies have come to Israel asking a familiar question: “Which start-up should we meet?” I believe the better question is: “Which problem should we bring?”
Instead of arriving with a list of technologies to scout, imagine a global bank bringing an operational challenge it has been unable to solve internally. The organization connects the people who actually own that problem with Israeli entrepreneurs and gives them enough access to understand it properly. The goal is not another innovation tour or a collection of impressive presentations. The goal is to test whether a solution can actually be built.
This changes the relationship. The Israeli start-up is no longer trying to sell a predetermined product to a multinational corporation. Instead, the corporation is using Israel as an environment in which it can explore solutions faster than its own structure may allow. The value is not only in finding the right technology. It is in shortening the distance between identifying a problem and testing whether a solution is possible.
Jewish business communities worldwide play a particularly interesting role here.
For generations, the relationship between Israel and the Jewish Diaspora has been built largely around identity and solidarity. Philanthropy has played an extraordinary role in Israel’s history and continues to do so. But business can become another meaningful layer of that relationship.
For a Jewish executive working inside a major corporation in New York or London, connecting with Israel does not have to mean only donating to an Israeli cause or investing personally in an Israeli company. It can mean opening a professional door. Bring a real business challenge to Israel. Connect an Israeli entrepreneur with the person inside your organization who owns that problem. Give them the opportunity to build something together.
That model is powerful because it changes the nature of the relationship. The conversation is no longer only about what Jewish communities around the world can do for Israel. It is also about what Israel can contribute to the companies and economies those communities help lead.
And perhaps that is the bigger opportunity.
Israel has spent decades building companies from a position of uncertainty. What was once seen primarily as a challenge has helped shape a generation of entrepreneurs who are comfortable moving forward before every answer is known.
Today, the rest of the business world is facing its own version of that reality. AI is rewriting industries faster than companies can plan for it. Business models that looked secure a few years ago are being challenged. The ability to adapt quickly is becoming less of an advantage and more of a requirement.
For years, the world has looked to Israel for the technologies it creates. Now, it should also look at the way Israel creates them. Because in a world where uncertainty is becoming the norm, knowing how to keep building through it may be Israel’s most valuable export.
Idan Tamir is VP of Corporate Development at Harel Insurance & Finance. He works at the intersection of technology, investment, and corporate innovation, connecting Israeli entrepreneurs with global companies, investors, and strategic partners.