Read: 05.25.16

“Do you think I’m insane?”                                                                                                                                                                    - Elon Musk

Elon Musk. Arguably the closest thing to Tony Stark the world can offer. A revolutionary? Possibly. A game-changer? Definitely. 

Nowadays it’s difficult to talk about technology without mentioning Elon Musk. I had a vague idea about who he was but this book made me realize how much I had underestimated his genius. Musk knows more than just how to solve problems. He can identify them before anyone else. He exploited the flaws in bank transactions. Paypal. He recognized the inefficiency of fossil fuels in the long run. Tesla. He was convinced that humanity needs to be an interplanetary species to survive. SpaceX. To Musk, it was only logical for these companies to be created—he who is aware of these problems should try to solve them. 

Unsurprisingly, being Musk is far from easy. There needs to be routine, patience. The ability to perform under pressure. Belief.

“Most people who are under that sort of pressure fray. Their decisions go bad. Elon gets hyper-rational. He’s still able to make very clear, long-term decisions. The harder it gets, the better he gets. Anyone who saw what he went through firsthand came away with more respect for the guy. I’ve just never seen anything like his ability to take pain.”                                                                             - Antonio Gracias (Investor)

How Musk came to develop such qualities is beyond me, but there's definitely some lesson my college self should learn here.

“Elon came to the conclusion early in his career that life is short. If you really embrace this, it leaves you with the obvious conclusion that you should be working as hard as you can.”                                                                                                                - JB Straubel (CTO at Tesla)

“My mentality is that of a samurai. I would rather commit seppuku than fail.”                                                                                                                                                                                               - Elon Musk

I actually felt like we shared many qualities, which isn’t necessarily a good thing.

“Elon’s worst trait by far, in my opinion, is a complete lack of loyalty or human connection. Many of us worked tirelessly for him for years and were tossed to the curb like a piece of litter without a second thought. Maybe it was calculated to keep the rest of the workforce on their toes and scared; maybe he was just able to detach from human connection to a remarkable degree. What was clear is that people who worked for him were like ammunition: used for a specific purpose until exhausted and discarded.”                                                                                                                                                          - Former Employee

Curtness really isn’t the way you should treat your employees, but I understand why this may be a popular perception. Musk just doesn’t have the time to deal with your shit. Every second he spends indulging in unnecessary emotions is a second taken away from achieving his goals. 

“Elon is incredibly difficult to work for, but it’s mostly because he’s so passionate. He can be impatient and say, ‘God damn it! This is what we have to do!’ and some people will get shell-shocked and catatonic. It seems like people can get afraid of him and paralyzed in a weird way…Ultimately, Elon is the boss. He has driven this thing with his blood, sweat, and tears. He has risked more than anyone else. I respect the hell out of what he has done. It just could not work without Elon.”                                                                                               - JB Straubel

This side of Musk was highlighted in a specific occasion, through which he gained my utmost respect. 

“The granddady example of Musk’s seemingly callous inter-office style occurred in 2014 when he fired Mary Beth Brown. To describe her as a loyal executive assistant would be grossly inadequate. Brown often felt like an extension of Musk—the one being who crossed over into all of his worlds. For more than a decade, she gave up her life for Musk, traipsing back and forth between Los Angeles and Silicon Valley every week, while working late into the night and on weekends. Brown went to Musk and asked that she be compensated on par with SpaceX’s top executives, since she was handling so much of Musk’s scheduling across two companies, doing public relations work and often making business decisions. Musk replied that Brown should take a couple of weeks off, and we would take on her duties and gauge how hard they were. When Brown returned, Musk let her know that he didn’t need her anymore, and he asked Shotwell’s assistant to begin scheduling his meetings. Brown, still loyal and hurt didn’t want to discuss any of this with me. Musk said that she had become too comfortable speaking on his behalf and that, frankly, she needed a life.”                                                                                                                                 - Ashlee Vance

One thing that amazed me about Musk’s operations was his ways of bringing everything in-house. While other rocket developmental facilities would transport parts from around the world, SpaceX would produce its own parts. Tesla and SolarCity too, practiced vertical integration and in turn, were in complete control of their business from start to finish. This not only lowered costs, but allowed these firms to establish a symbiotic relationship to one another.     

“Each one of his businesses is interconnected in the short term and the long term. Tesla makes battery packs that SolarCity can then sell to end customers. SolarCity supplies Tesla’s charging stations with solar panels, helping Tesla to provide free recharging to its drivers. Newly minted Model S owners regularly opt to begin living the Musk Lifestyle and outfit their homes with solar panels. Tesla and SpaceX help each other as well. They exchange knowledge around materials, manufacturing techniques, and the intricacies of operating factories that build so much stuff from the ground up.”                                                                                                                                    - Ashlee Vance

There are so many things I’d like to learn from Elon Musk. There are so many things I learned about Elon Musk. I would really like to meet him one day. On a more ambitious note, I would really like him to want to meet me one day. 

My favorite part of his interview by far: Musk’s perspective on raising kids.

“It bothers Musk a bit that his kids won’t suffer like he did. He feels that the suffering helped to make him who he is and gave him extra reserves of strength and will.”                                                                                                                                                           - Ashlee Vance

“They might have a little adversity at school, but these days schools are so protective. If you call someone a name, you get sent home. When I was going to school, if they punched you and there was no blood, it was like, ‘Whatever. Shake it off.’ Even if there was a little blood, but not a lot, it was fine. What do I do? Create artificial adversity? How do you do that? The biggest battle I have is restricting their video game time because they want to play all the time. The only rule is they have to read more than they play video games. They also can’t play completely stupid video games There’s one game they downloaded recently called Cookies or something. You literally tap a fucking cookie. It’s like a Psych 101 experiment. I made them delete the cookie game. They had to play Flappy Golf instead, which is like Flappy Bird, but at least there is some physics involved.”                                                                                                                                          - Elon Musk

Vance, Ashlee. Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future. New York: HarperCollins, 2015. Print.