Elon Musk

by Walter Isaacson

This emotional shutoff valve could make him callous, but it also made him a risk-seeking innovator. “He learned to shut down fear,” she says. “If you turn off fear, then maybe you have to turn off other things, like joy or empathy.”

While other entrepreneurs struggled to develop a worldview, he developed a cosmic view.

All requirements should be treated as recommendations, he repeatedly instructed. The only immutable ones were those decreed by the laws of physics.

“Risk is a type of fuel.”

“If conventional thinking makes your mission impossible,” Musk told him, “then unconventional thinking is necessary.”

Question every requirement.

Delete any part or process you can.

Simplify and optimize.

Accelerate cycle time.

Automate.

All technical managers must have hands-on experience.

Comradery is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other’s work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided.

It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong.

Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do.

Whenever there are problems to solve, don’t just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the...

When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes ...

A maniacal sense of urgency is our operat...

The only rules are the ones dictated by the laws of physics. Everything el...

” He later admitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission that choosing a price as a dope joke was not a wise move.

“To anyone I’ve offended, I just want to say, I reinvented electric cars and I’m sending people to Mars in a rocket ship. Did you think I was also going to be a chill, normal dude?”