Elon Musk’s Lessons From Hell: Five Commandments for Business

livemint.com:

Simply put: Elon Musk can be a real jerk. And that has probably helped and hurt him in business, according to a new biography by Walter Isaacson. In “Elon Musk," out Tuesday, Isaacson puts forth the idea of “demon mode" to explain the temperamental impulses behind some of the tycoon’s successes—and setbacks.

But it isn’t just demon mode that has fueled his rise. Isaacson details other teachable ways the billionaire’s methods have helped make him the world’s richest man. Both sides of Musk are sure to become part of B-school lore for a new generation of would-be entrepreneurs and business managers picking and choosing which traits and tactics to emulate.

Isaacson had previously made the concept of the “reality distortion field" popular with his bestselling 2011 book about Apple co-founder Steve Jobs and his ability to bend perception to motivate others. Demon mode was on display in 2018 as Musk struggled to ramp production of Tesla’s Model 3 sedan, which nearly destroyed the electric-car company and which the CEO dubbed production hell. That experience through hell, the book says, also helped Musk shape five commandments for how he wants problems solved by his workers across his companies from rocket maker SpaceX to social-media platform X, formerly Twitter.

Musk, in the book, calls the framework for problem solving “the algorithm." In short, Musk urges his employees to: Question every requirementDelete any part or process you can Simplify and optimize Accelerate cycle timeAutomate “His executives sometimes move their lips and mouth the words, like they would chant the liturgy along with their priest," Isaacson wrote of Musk’s mantra. In the book, Musk acknowledges he talks about the approach often. “I became a broken