What makes Elon Musk so effective? I'm more interested in why. \ stacker news ~builders

What makes Elon Musk so effective? I'm more interested in why.

1753 sats \ 37 comments \ @k00b 3h builders

Elon just cares about being effective more than anything else and has identified what's required to be effective. Andreessen does a great job explaining that. What's more interesting to me is why, especially if it's as obvious as Andreesen implies. If Elon is able to care about being effective more than anything else, why is it other people can't/don't? If I had to guess, it's related to something I've heard Elon say a lot: "I want to be useful." He pursues this to a pathological and self-destructive degree.

imo The origin of "I want to be useful" is the severe bullying his biographers have covered. Having suffered bullies growing up, if it persists long enough you realize the best defense for being bullied is being useful to as many people as you might need to defend you. It then becomes somewhat of a feedback loop: as you become more useful, the number of people and their desire to destroy you grows, and your best defense is becoming more useful to even more people and so on.

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185 sats \ 4 replies \ @JesseJames 3h

he truly gives a shit, is my professional assessment...lol unfortunately not many people do these days...

0 sats \ 3 replies \ @DesertDave 36m

What makes you think he gives a true shit?

219 sats \ 2 replies \ @JesseJames 25m

hmm.... his track record maybe? "We will make fully electric fast car" - done "We will start the internet satellite service" - done "We will make re-usable rocket" - done "We will go to mars" - pending He seems to do things he said he will do, it stands to reason he does give a shit of what he says and does... Maybe it's me, but if half of people would do the same I have a feeling we would be better off and in slightly better place. I could be wrong, I have been wrong before :-) Majority of things he does it does benefit the society, don't ya think? I can't be certain how "true" he is, I can only see what he does.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DesertDave 11m

How have these things helped humans specifically?

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DesertDave 12m

The majority is often wrong. Look at money. And all those things you listed are pointless to me. And that is just one mans perspective. I don't know anything. But I "feel" like he has a big ego and is looking to control as much as possible. There are always facts available to confirm our own bias. To me that doesn't play much if a roll in how I see the world. I follow my gut. He may be very good for us and appreciate your ideas. And I appreciate the fact that you are open to being wrong. This is important. I am also open to being wrong. I would rather him be a positive force than for me to be "right". It's an interesting topic here on stacker.

176 sats \ 1 reply \ @Car 1h

I've come to realize Elon understands human psychology at a high level. Most effective leaders have this quality about them. He also sees the impossible as possible, heard a story that revolved around Elons inner circle in the 2000’s making fun of him every time he came around talking about his electric car startup. Most people are afraid of humiliation, some embrace it as a badge of honor and a reason to keep going.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DesertDave 36m

Did he start Tesla?

154 sats \ 0 replies \ @didiplaywell 1h

It's an engineering mindset. The exact same mindset you use to design something is the one you can use to organize something, for it's all about "allocating matter" at the end, be it metal, be it resources.

One of the key aspects of a good engineering project is task division and cohesion: one team will design this section, another this one, etc. So it's not only the mindset needed to design a bolt but the mindset needed to think where it goes, who works with this next, what about costs? logistics? etc.

So, all what's needed to be efficient is already there. The key to efficiency is not about getting it but about not ruining it.

The key to his success is thus in this phrase: Too many MBAs ruining companies

People was extremely efficient before, that's how extremely sophisticated planes and cars where designed with pencil and paper. The problem started when the MBA corporate culture began to corrode everything. A culture of accommodating people based on their self-perceived importance, not their usefulness.

So, Musk is simply getting back to basics. One of the reasons I admire him and trust him is that, with an MBA sub-culture already in place, it takes great humility to take yourself out of the way and let people work. The MBA sub-culture does the exact opposite out of ego and the never ending need to justify a job position that should not exist.

This "anit-MBA" policy (aka "rub no one's ego" policy) is perfectly summed up in is anti-handbook" manual.

149 sats \ 0 replies \ @asterisk32 2h

Summary, being HARD-CORE, long-hours with high intensty.

Oh and some Ketamine prescriptions for the depression that comes with all of it https://edition.cnn.com/2024/03/18/tech/elon-musk-ketamine-use-don-lemon-interview/index.html

Seems like to be him you've got to willing to, for lack of better phrasing, "TEAR YOUR HEART OUT"

142 sats \ 3 replies \ @realBitcoinDog 48m

Relentless sheer force of will

Sleeping in Tesla factory in 2018 while death ready to eat his face off only enough funds to make payroll for four more weeks

0 sats \ 2 replies \ @DesertDave 34m

How do you know he slept in the factory in 2018?

0 sats \ 1 reply \ @realBitcoinDog 28m

I did a quick YouTube but couldn’t easily find that clip. I know it’s part of larger 2hr interview. From when producing Model 3 in 2018 and trying to secure funding from Saudi Arabia

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DesertDave 24m

So what does this really tell you? You didn't hang out with him while he slept in the factory an entire year. You believed a story. There are plenty of stories. This is why I believe unless we meditate enough to understand ourselves and our biases, we can't make an honest assessment of our reality. We are all biased and believe what we want to believe, right?

13 sats \ 0 replies \ @B_rian 17m

He makes people believe the impossible is possible and he's willing to risk everything and sacrifice anyone to prove it.

47 sats \ 15 replies \ @DesertDave 1h

I believe he is an egomaniac that wants as much power and control as possible. I don't see what value he has brought humans. I am fully prepared to be wrong about this. I would rather be wrong than for him to be what I think he is. Time will tell I suppose..

137 sats \ 14 replies \ @Undisciplined 1h

Even if your assessment is correct, isn't there still an interesting question about why he's been so effective? It's not like there's a notable shortage of power hungry egomaniacs.

88 sats \ 2 replies \ @DesertDave 1h

Sure. It's interesting. But what is effective? Doing a lot does not mean doing a lot of good necessarily. It depends on your world view. Mine is such that jI don't see his accomplishments. I see wasted energy. And I can see how others see him as incredibly productive. Depends on what you value.

11 sats \ 1 reply \ @Undisciplined 1h

I get where you're coming from. I think the interesting thing to consider, even if you don't value the results he's achieved, is whether there's something valuable in his process.

Regardless of whether you or I value what Elon has done, he has done a lot of what he set out to do. Can we learn from his method to accomplish more of what we want to do?

7 sats \ 0 replies \ @DesertDave 1h

Maybe. I learn from sitting in silence. Heroes always get knocked off eventually. I have had many heroes in the past. I used to like Elon in fact. And he got revealed just like they all do.

2 sats \ 10 replies \ @DesertDave 1h

What do you think are his most important contributions to mankind?

11 sats \ 9 replies \ @Undisciplined 1h

I'm not a big Elon guy. There's a chance some of his space or solar technologies end up making a very large difference for humanity, but my knowledge of those things is fairly shallow.

79 sats \ 8 replies \ @DesertDave 56m

To me this is completely insane. The only reason we do not have peace here on earth is humans that are hurting each other. It's perfect here. Why would we take our problems to a dead red planet? It doesn't make any sense. To think we could thrive there better than here is completely counterintuitive. But most people have no intuition left. Maybe he is right. Maybe we need to go to Mars. But I really think it's about hype and stock price go up. Elon delivers on some things but most he doesn't. He makes big bold claims and falls short consistently. Maybe he's a visionary. I think it's all an act. And he is part of a bigger machine that is quite anti human. I would love to be wrong by the way. Again, I used to be a big fan of his.

11 sats \ 7 replies \ @Undisciplined 47m

I wasn't referencing colonizing Mars. I also think that's pointless.

What is in space, though, that's extremely valuable to humanity, are mineral rich asteroids. These have the potential to radically reduce our scarcity of precious metals, which will make mining on Earth unnecessary/uneconomical and drive down the costs of new technology.

54 sats \ 6 replies \ @DesertDave 44m

Do you think the moon landing was real? I believe that space exploration is a psyop. A complete myth. A fools errand. A distraction. Am I right? No idea. That's just what my gut tells me which isn't worth much to anyone other than me.

0 sats \ 5 replies \ @Undisciplined 35m

I do think the Moon Landing was real. They left reflectors up there that you can independently verify (if you have a powerful enough laser). We measured a reflection off the Moon when I was in undergrad and that only works because of those reflectors. Otherwise, the beam would be to randomly dispersed by the uneven terrain to return a coherent signal.

Where I do buy into some of the conspiracy stuff, is that the documentation of the Moon Landing does seem very sketchy and likely fake.

My personal theory is that the Moon Landing happened but the technology to record and photograph it didn't exist, so they faked that part for PR reasons.

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99 sats \ 1 reply \ @k00b OP 3h

Hmmm bug, my video isn’t loading on mobile. We might need to adjust some things to support longer videos.

11 sats \ 0 replies \ @didiplaywell 1h

Nor in the PC either!

110 sats \ 1 reply \ @DarthCoin 3h

https://corbettreport.com/musk/

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DesertDave 1h

You all better listen to Darth on this one. You know he is right.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @realBitcoinDog 30m

2min video. “Starting a company is like staring into the abyss and eating glass. They give you both the worst problems, and the things nobody wants to work on.”

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @DesertDave 54m

His ability to make other think that he is effective.

0 sats \ 0 replies \ @7e6e393a56 1h

Careful! Many despots wanted to be useful to society. Elon Musk wanted to strike Bolivia because of Lithium... I could list several other controversial actions of his here Your ego is as big as your fortune