True innovation and success, particularly in disruptive fields, require an unconventional mindset that challenges existing limitations, embraces extreme dedication, and prioritizes genuine passion over conventional metrics.
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Success was never one of the possible
outcomes. If you're in the matrix,
success was never possible. The only way
to achieve success is to reprogram the
matrix such that success is one of the
possible outcomes. I wanted to try to
build something useful, but uh I didn't
think I would build anything
particularly great. You said
probabilistically seemed unlikely. Uh
but I wanted to at least try. I talked
to my professor was can I like defer for
the quarter because this will probably
fail and then I'll need to come back to
college. And then he said this is
probably the last conversation we'll
have. The only reason I started a
company back in 95, an internet company,
was because I couldn't get it. There
were only a few internet companies and I
couldn't get a job at any of them. So, I
tried to get a job at at Netscape, um,
and sent my resume in. I tried hanging
out in the lobby, but I was too shy to
talk to anyone. And, uh, and then I was
like, "Okay, well, I guess I'll have to
start a company cuz I can't get a job
anywhere." If you're trying to figure
out what others love, but you don't love
it, it's really hard to make that great.
So when you work on something,
if you fall in love with it, that's
that's a good sign. Um, and then don't
worry about it if others do. If if you
do, others will. I mean, there wasn't
any other way to make it work. The 3
years of hell, 17, 8, 2017, 18, and 19
was the longest period of excruciating
pain in my life. There wasn't any other
way. And we barely made it, and we're on
the ragged edge of bankruptcy the entire
time. So
>> So when you want pain, I don't like it.
Those were three three so so so much
pain but it had to be done or Tesla
would be dead. My workload went up from
about I don't know 70 to 8 hours a week
to probably 120. Go to sleep, I wake up,
I work, go to sleep, wake up, work, do
that 7 days a week. I'll have to do that
for a while. No choice. Measure of
success, I'd say like what how many
useful things can I get done?
>> Uh day-to-day basis, you wake up in the
morning, how can I be useful today?
>> Yeah. maximize utility area under the
cope of usefulness very difficult to be
useful at scale.
>> The companies that will succeed in this
transition period will be the ones that
most effectively use AI. So if you're
doing something and making maximum use
of AI and you're competing against
someone who is not, you will win. I
talked to my son in university and he's
uh was like how many of your classmates
are using AI to help them write things
and he said all of them. I was confident
that at the time that we launched no one
could think of anything that would
improve the probability of success. We
racked our brains to think of any
possible way to improve the probability
of success. And we could not think of
anything more, nor could NASA, and so
that's just the best that we could do.
So then we we went ahead and launched.
Now, I'm not a religious person, but I
nonetheless got on my knees and prayed
for that mission.
>> How did it feel when it was a success?
First, when the launch was a success,
and when they returned back home, it
>> was a great relief. The ability to
attract and motivate great people is
critical to the success of a company
because a company is just that's it's a
group of people that are assembled to
create a product or service. That's the
purpose of a company. You know, if
you're able to get great people to join
the company, work together towards a
common goal and uh and you're sort of
have a
relentless sense of perfection about
that goal, then you will end up with a
great product.
And if you have a great product, lots of
people will buy it
>> and then the company will be successful. >> Yeah.
>> Yeah.
>> But really, it's pretty straightforward really.
really.
>> Then you got to live at the factory to
make it work. If you've been back in you
moved to Texas, then you went back up to
San Francisco because of Twitter.
>> So I think things are reasonably
stabilized right now. It it was just on
on the on the fast track to bankruptcy
after the acquisition. So I had to take
uh drastic action. There wasn't any choice.
choice.
>> I'm just saying it's hard for a woman
like when the guy lives at the factory.
>> Yes. The thing is that if you listen to
surveys of do people want an electric
car, there's no way you'd start an
electric car company because people
don't don't say yes. They're happy with
their current car. Henry Ford famously
said if you ask people back then what
they wanted, they'd say they wanted a
faster horse and they would not have
said they want an automobile. I think
there's also famous survey, would you
buy a television? And I think 90% of
people said no. It's because people
don't understand what this new thing is
that you're offering. You need to be
able to imagine how someone would enjoy
the product. If that seems compelling,
then I think you should move forward
with it.
>> I do think it's important to not get uh
you know, quote Scarface, don't get high
on your own supply. Of course, in the
end, you did. You don't want to start
thinking too highly of yourself. Um cuz
it actually reduces your feedback loop.
You you if you think you're too smart,
you stop listening to criticism.
>> I mean, if you're going to try something
innovative, then then you're in
unexplored territories. So, the odds
that something will go wrong are pretty
high. uh if you know it's only if you
try to do something that is already well
understood that um there's a little
little chance of failure um but then it
will not be uh interesting or innovative
um so you know for sure uncharted
territory will result in um failures uh
necessarily otherwise you're not trying
hard enough trying time is a true currency
currency
>> if you if you look at say Tesla I mean
Tesla this year will do over 100 billion
in revenue so that's $2 billion a week. Um,
Um,
if I make slightly better decisions, I
can affect the outcome by a billion
dollars. You know, I try to do the best
decisions I can. I would never get any
sleep. It's it would just be like, I
need to just keep working and and work
my brain harder, you know, and I'm not
trying to get as much as possible out of
this meat computer. The marginal value
of of a better decision can easily be in
the course of an hour hund00 million of
time can be $100 million an hour at
times or more.
>> Do you have like terrible ideas, good
ideas, too many ideas?
>> I have too many ideas. Ideas are
relatively easy. Execution is hard.
>> Are people inside your company, do they
have ideas? >> Yes.
>> Yes.
>> And what do you how does that work? How
do they how do they pitch an idea to to you?
you?
>> So, it's not really a pitching process.
I have meetings with the engineering and
design teams and we discuss, you know,
product or new products, but there's no
actual sort of formal pitching or
anything. We we meet all the time and
people come up with ideas and move
forward with them while we're doing try
to learn a little bit about a lot of
things cuz you might not know what
you're really interested. How would you
know what you're really interested in if
you had at least peripheral exploration
broadly of the knowledge landscape you
talk to people from different walks of
life and different uh industries and
professions and skills and learn as much
as possible. Like one of the most
difficult choices I have ever faced uh
in life was was in 2008. I think I had
maybe $30 million left. I had two
choices. Put it all into one company and
then the other company would definitely
die or split it. And but if I split it
between two companies, then both might
die. Blood, sweat, and tears into
creating something or building
something. It's like a child. Yeah.
Everything was going wrong at once. Uh
three rocket failures in a row in the
beginning and uh Tesla financing round
was falling apart or fell apart. Um the
uh Solar City was having difficulties
getting divorced.
>> Yeah, it
>> was really terrible. >> Yeah.
>> Yeah.
>> Uh so uh I was I was very sad
>> but then everything was perfect when it
took was in space.
>> Yeah. At the end of 2008 the fourth
launch worked. >> Yes.
>> Yes.
>> Uh which is we that was all the money we
had but nothing more you know. In fact,
originally I budgeted I thought, "Okay,
we can do three survived three
failures." Um, so take like we we just
barely barely scrape together enough to
do a fourth launch.
>> Um, and um,
and then at the end of 2008, we we got a
big NASA contract literally on December
23rd, I think it was.
>> Yeah. Um, so it went from like really
terrible to um I remember that Sunday
before Christmas in 2008 thinking like that
that
like this is the closest I've ever come
to a nervous breakdown. If other people
putting in 48 hour work weeks and you're
putting in 100 hour work weeks, then
even if you're doing the same thing, you
know that you will achieve in 4 months
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