As you begin to work your way towards your goal, it gradually dawns on you that besides hard work you need some guiding principles to propel you forward. Some people derive inspiration from books written by those who achieved spectacular success where they describe their stories of how they made up their minds to rise to the heights of fame. While you won’t be able to pass the same way these men and women did, you can appreciate their doggedness – and pick up a few hints as to how they could handle various problems that impede their progress.
Elon Musk belongs with those whose success is undeniable and scintillating. We are no longer as interested in how many billions exactly he owns as in what makes him stand aside from other tech tycoons and financial geniuses – because it is clear he walks mysterious ways and maintains his self-imposed rules and ethics. Some of them you will find in this article – see if they work for you too?
Work all hours to break through
When we say “all work and no play” it means we are averse to working too much and missing out on life’s pleasures. Often it is meant facetiously. But the CEO of Tesla’s believes in it implicitly. Different sources were unanimous in stating that Musk held to highly unconventional working hours and worked away as if he was on a salary. Considering how many companies he has his finger in, his working day may comprise up to 80 hours a week and more! Musk himself admitted in an interview that he prefers working to eating meals. Of course, Tesla, SpaceX, and Paypal all require a lot of attention, yet is it really possible? At least, not instead of meals; hopefully somebody sees to it that he has a regular intake of healthy foods.
Turn out the product and forget about advertising
Such an outstanding billionaire as Elon Musk can avail himself of any amount of top-class business advice. He can’t very well know everything while setting up a company requires a lot of abilities and savvy. When you launch a company and it presents itself to the public, these first months are crucial and can make or break the whole project. The public is expected to embrace the product. But Musk is sure that the quality of the product should be of the prevailing importance – and marketing could be ignored as dispensable. In the modern world, this notion sounds highly questionable. Needless to say, we love quality products when we see them, but before we catch sight of them we need some PR to know which way to turn.
Reading up on everything
Musk is nothing if not deeply intelligent. His perspicacity is something to be envied. Where did he obtain his wisdom? According to him, at his young age, he was an avid reader. Many children were out on the playground, but little Elon was engrossed in his scientific volume. He pointed out The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy as his all-time favorite. Discoursing on his conclusions, he said that people should expand their consciousness so they could see better into their future and know what issues to put first and foremost. “The only thing that makes sense is to strive for greater collective enlightenment,” is his prevalent idea. It really looks promising, so maybe Musk will not only offer us quality products but also lead us to a happier life.
You don’t do it to earn money
There’s no doubt Musk is no longer in it for money – his thoughts are directed far into the future. Probably it is this inclination to think forward that makes certain people to strike out and end up as billionaires. Knowing that Musk has even habitable planets on his mind, we can safely assume that he comes up with a solution way before a problem asserts itself. Well, he has his grounds to think little of his pile of money; nevertheless he needs it for many purposes: carry out research, expand his activities, embrace fresh spheres. Money is something you can’t get away from that easily.
Share your problems with the world
The common company procedure is to address all questions and arising problems up to managers. The results are often discouraging: no answers are forthcoming, problems are put aside and forgotten. Managers either don’t communicate properly or fail to sort out issues between them. Within Musk’s companies a different approach is employed: instead of delegating issues to their direct superiors (and probably get stuck while they are handling them), employees feel free to take the matter up to a manager and talk it over with him. The point is to solve the problem quickly and get on with work. It is certainly an applicable project, but what about managers? Won’t their becoming redundant affect the functionality of the whole company?
Meetings are useless and altogether a waste of time
Many company men look upon meetings as a strong medium for intercommunication within the company. To Elon Musk meetings are completely disposable procedures eating up useful time. So he doesn’t want to do anything with them. Several years ago all Tesla employees received emails containing guidelines for successful work composed by Musk himself. About meetings, he wrote calling them “a blight” and recommended not to have them at all unless it is a question related to the whole company. Meanwhile, practically all meetings are obligatory and an employee who misses them gets in the black book quickly. Right or wrong the billionaire is, it goes counter our current state of affairs.
No rules at all
Any applicant for a good job expects to be made to run a pretty stiff gauntlet. Among the tasks is often a questionnaire intended to reveal the applicant’s approach to various job-related situations. They usually include the question of whether it is important to observe the rules. Invariably you are supposed to answer “yes” – or say good-bye to the vacancy. As for Elon Musk, such thing as company rules just doesn’t exist for him. He puts his faith in common sense thinking rather than following rules which are unlikely to be properly developed. A Musk employee is supposed to use his intuition which in turn is supposed to work to the company’s boon and eventually to success.
So many people are sure that rules are to be broken, at least some of them!
