Bibliography

1. Quora. "What Is It Like to Work With Elon Musk?" Slate Magazine. Slate, 24 Aug. 2013. Web. 26 Nov. 2013. <http://www.slate.com/blogs/quora/2013/08/14/elon_musk_what_is_it_like_to_work_for_the_spacex_tesla_chief.html>.
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9. D'Onfro, Jillian. "11 Elon Musk Quotes That Show His Genius." Business Insider. Business Insider, 11 Sept. 2013. Web. 26 Nov. 2013. <http://www.businessinsider.com/11-elon-musk-quotes-2013-9?op=1>.

Fun Facts

1. Elon Musk just released designs for a High-Speed Train (Pic Below)
2. He’s from South Africa
3. He left home to avoid serving in the Military 
4. He decided to focus on three area’s he thought would benefit humanity (internet, clean en-ergy and space)
5. He has also contributed largely to Charity 

Final Reflection

      Overall, I really like Elon Musk and I’m very inspired by him too. He continues to show how innovation has no limits and proves impossible possible. Of course no one can be perfect and Elon Musk too has things he could really improve on. Personally, He could improve by taking out time for himself. He is too engrossed into technology and has forgotten to live like a normal human. He works day and night, works for 100 hours a week, always on his iPhone looking at news, Elon is certainly living like a robot and of course it’s upto him how he wants to do it. But it’d be good if he took some rest too as, he is already 42 and it wouldn't be good for him to take so much stress and work so hard but as Elon says, his quotes show how he is and what kind of person he is.

Elon’s Quotes:

Failure is an option here. If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough.”

[My biggest mistake is probably] weighing too much on someone's talent and not someone's personality. I think it matters whether someone has a good heart.

“If something is important enough, even if the odds are against you, you should still do it.

“It is remarkable how many things you can explode. I’m lucky I have all my fingers.”

People have even said that Elon Musk is more interesting than Steve Jobs ...

Organisational Structure

      Both, Tesla Motors and SpaceX’s organisational structures are undisclosed but it is known that Elon mainly and specifically likes to go by the Flat structure. In this structure, there are less sub dividends and there are more employees under one, which makes it easier to report and work too. Of course it has its cons too everything would have its cons but Elon aims to minimize the disad-vantages as much as he can so he could further improve his pros, this thinking makes him vision-ary and makes his organization structure work in a stable and fluent manner. 

Corporate Culture

      Elon Musk, like his other marvels and doings this too was one of his marvelous marvels. His corporate culture at SpaceX and Tesla Motors differ in many ways. Lets start off with SpaceX.

SpaceX:

      In SpaceX, Elon just wants one thing. Work Hard. He pushes himself harder and harder even though he succeeds. Reviews from the workers show that no matter what, if he fails or passes he’d still work harder and try to achieve even more. Elon is the type of person who knows theres always  one extra step to something. For SpaceX this would pretty much it, the corporate culture would be a strict culture and not really fun or ‘play’ culture. 

      Moving on to Tesla Motors, here it can be greatly related to that of Apple’s culture. Tesla’s corporate culture is a lot similar to that of Apple’s. In Tesla they practice a little bit of play culture to give the employees a boost and to make them feel comfortable by their environment so they can think and come up with ideas which help innovate and this is how Elon likes it. He wants innovation and ideas and this all comes from a lot of brains comfortably thinking. 

Communication

      Moving on to communication, Elon Musk takes this as one of his main priorities and does his best to create a communicative environment while making it disciplinary too. This makes him a strong communicator. Of course, there can be many types and examples of communications for example, financial communication and even communication among teammates. Whatever the communication might be, if it is efficient and engaging it results with high quality results and per-formance hence proving the leaders communication strength. In Tesla Motors and SpaceX as I had mentioned before too, Elon Musk has shown great examples for himself and set an idol for the employees so they’d be enthusiasts at work and at home with such a great leader who wouldn’t want to go to work. 

Recruitment

       Elon Musk is very smart when it comes to recruit someone for his company. He gives a chance to anyone and everyone who applies for the job. For some jobs though he specifically requires straight to the point qualifications and terms which is of course very sensible and simple.

Lets take a look at his companies Tesla and SpaceX.

SpaceX:

Director Of Total Rewards (Compensation and Benefits)

RESPONSIBILITIES:

• Design and build compensation and performance programs in partnership  with  executive management team, align rewards with performance.
• Implement creative solutions for equity programs and manage dilution.
• Supported by a senior analyst, partner with HR Business partners to drive and ensure the success of compensation programs and strive for continuous improvement.
• Play a governance role in the creation, negotiation, and review of compensation programs business rules
• Develop and manage a leading benefits program and processes.
• Work independently, prioritize multiple stakeholders and tasks, and manage work time efficiently.
• Manage the design and development of tools to assist employees in benefits selection, understanding our benefits programs, and provide an engaging employee experience.
• Keep abreast of employment legislation, arbitration decisions, and collective bargaining issues to assess industry trends and impacts on our business.

REQUIRED SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE:

• BA or BS degree in economics, business administration or another field that uses quantitative analysis or equivalent experience (advanced degree preferred)
• A minimum of 10 years’ experience in the compensation and benefits field in a consultancy or corporate environment, experience with a public company preferred
• Deep interest in analyzing data and the ability to see beyond the numbers to drive sound decision-making
• Knowledge of Microsoft Excel (familiarity with statistical packages and SQL a plus)
• Solutions and client service-oriented, with an emphasis on creativity and relationships
• Proven leadership skills and understanding of team dynamics
• Proven organizational skills with attention to detail and the ability to prioritize and work well in an environment with competing demands
• Ability to work in a team environment with a high sense of urgency
• Exceptional written and verbal communications skills as well as strong interpersonal skills

ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS:

• To conform to U.S. Government space technology export regulations, applicant must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State.
•  Whereas for Tesla Motors:
• He goes by external recruitment solely. He likes to use social sites as his base for getting employees. Elon is very famous for using Twitter to search for engineer’s for Tesla.

Leadership Style

      Elon Musk is currently an incredibly successful entrepreneur and inventor. He dropped out of Stanford University to create his first company, Zip2. With this, he then went on to create PayPal, which he then later sold to eBay. With the profits he got from this he then created Tesla Motors and Space X, Being the CEO of both companies. Now how does this show his amazing leadership? Well, both Tesla Motors and Space X are companies which create revolutionary products: Tesla Motors creates the Tesla Roadster which is an electric car, and SpaceX created the Dragon Capsule the first privately made spacecraft which was to ever docked with the ISS (International Space Station).

      The reason why I chose Elon Musk was because of his leadership way. He is futuristic and he is transformational. He creates the culture of brilliance and excellence in all his businesses. In this style, Elon’s employees do not have any low key level exchanges, instead people are drawn to his companies by of course his influential work, dedication and persistence. Musk creates great examples so his employees get motivated in an intrinsic way and work harder. He would typically work over 100 hours a week, which created an expression at SpaceX, “No matter how hard you work, someone else is working harder,” and of course that someone else is Musk. This makes the employees at Tesla Motors and SpaceX to be known for being productive and innovative. When looked more into his leadership style. He has achieved a lot to prove his leadership worthiness. Namely: 2011 Churchill for Legendary Leadership, the 2012 breakthrough leadership award by Popular Mechanics and he was places #66 on the 2012 Forbes most powerful people list.

Reflection:

There are many successful entrepreneurs, but few as dynamic as Elon Musk.  Musk works tirelessly to create revolutionary companies, such as SpaceX and Tesla Motors.  Due to his work ethic and dedication, Musk inspired a generation of young engineers to work at his companies and believe in a shared vision.  Musk is a master of the transformational style of leadership, and as a result, he has built revolutionary companies that create cutting edge products.

Elon Musk: The Genius

What is leadership? 

Personally, I would define leadership where the unique individual would lead a group or even an organisation. When looked upon leaders and leadership you can come across millions of examples, every single example with its own unique leader with some sort of different leadership pattern or trend. When I relate leadership to this man I learned a lot. Elon Musk, he is a genius. 

Who is he?

Elon Musk a multimillionaire just by the age of 28. Born in South Africa. He was always different right from the start. Buying his first computer by the age of 10, he already started to teach himself how to program and whats more astonishing when he was only 12, he made his first software sale of game he created himself called Blaster for $500. His first step to build his present $9 billion dollar net worth. For a young boy, he was just brilliant. He moved on to Canada at the age of 17 by obtaining Canadian citizenship through his mother. He did so to avoid service in the South African Military and also it’d be easier to migrate to USA from Canada than South Africa. This showed how he always planned out his future right from the start. He knew he would make it to US as a successful man.

Now, He is an American business investor, inventor, entrepreneur, engineer, and magnate. He currently owns 3 companies, namely: Tesla Motors, SpaceX and PayPal.