There are things to be gleaned from maverick entrepreneur’s stellar story
INSIDE my Christmas stocking was a taste of my own medicine.
For years I have taught my children the importance of an informed, educated opinion. Apparently, my eyerolling at Elon Musk’s comments in the media came from a lack of understanding of how the billionaire is shaping our future.
As such, it was deemed time for me to work my way through the New York Times bestseller on Musk to see what I could learn. Reflections indeed are there for the reader.
I have never been in doubt that Elon is an outlier, a gifted intelligent man with a vision of the future eminently clear long before others can see a way through the problems presented.
Fear of failure appears absent from Musk’s view and it sure hasn’t all been plain sailing for him, a fiery demise of the starship prototype SN8 in December the most recent example.
He doesn’t keep score by the billions in the bank. It seems just a handy fact that his wealth increased over $100 billion in 2020.
Instead, he strives to look at different models of how to do things, his view is unashamedly longterm and ambitious, and technology is the way he integrates people and ideas to change our society.
Avoiding catastrophic failure in the highstakes game he plays requires detailed knowledge built from careful research coupled with surrounding himself with carefully selected teams who appear unconstrained by traditional corporate policy.
Here, groups of people unite around common purpose v a rule play of what has gone before. Of course when you are playing in the space that he is, it is inevitable that not everything will go to plan as test upon test is carried out to advance the technologies necessary to deliver products to market.
A plan of attack picked, if failure presents, simply try a new approach. Musk is definitely in the camp of don’t ring me with a problem, present me with a solution.
Excuses are not allowed to prevail, a clear response and plan of attack to resolve the issues is what is required.
Problems are simply obstacles to overcome and every ‘‘no’’ answer he receives is just a step closer to solving the problem and achieving a ‘‘yes’’ against the vision he holds clear.
It is easy to be swept up in a more than 700% share price rise in Tesla last year and think wouldn’t it be great to have a Musk in your camp.
Technologyenabled vision meets environmental solution delivering shareholder returns and an enviable social licence to operate . . . it reads like a textbook play.
Nothing is ever that simple though; views around any board table can range from cautious pragmatism to an allencompassing ideology of changing the world.
Getting alignment on a vision and the big picture clear requires skill and diplomacy, experience and resolve.
If the board and chief executive are not tight on the plan on a page and associated deliverables for which accountability will be measured, no amount of press conference hype and employee workshopping will steer your company, nor its investors and stakeholders through to delivery against that vision.
I am reminded of the expression to go fast go alone, to go far go together.
Musk seems to have opted for a bit of both across his stellar story so far, and some documented partings of the ways show that it is one thing to be able to read society and anticipate its needs, it is another altogether to be able to manage a collective towards achieving that outcome.
That is the skill, being able to vividly describe a future that everyone from the office junior to the chairperson can identify with and articulate their own contribution towards its delivery is critical.
To go far together requires tangible support. Support is not simply about standing together in times of success, it is also about jointly identifying and fronting moments of failure.
Failure is of course how we learn. Innovation is demanding, the pathway littered with imperfections, learning when to exit a programme that is not progressing as it should counts just as much as being brave enough to act on an idea or to make the decision to double down.
How are you defining the pathway for innovation inside your organisation? Is it mainstream to challenge the status quo or just part of an annual strategy retreat? How do you support and reward ideas? Is innovation just the domain of the upper hierarchy or enabled across the organisation? What are the changing consumer behaviours that affect your business? Where do you see your competition coming from, the same industry as yourself or someone redefining the problem and presenting another solution? How has the team reset the skill base required to manage all this?
Corporate history is littered with examples of those that failed to pay attention to changing patterns and allowed the often cited Netflix, Uber and Airbnb to forge a new direction.
Remember Microsoft’s Ballmer on the original iPhone or his call that Google was a house of cards?
My current favourite is Focus@will, a music concentration app perhaps unlikely to be on the horizon of coffee makers, yet I find myself grabbing my ear buds and tuning into it rather than reaching for another flat white.
We are fortunate to live in an age where technology makes so much possible. While the word disruption is bandied around all too often, if we, like Musk, dare to believe in the possible and technology’s ability to advance ideas, and if we create an environment where innovation is encouraged, then our organisations too may be like Musk’s and reshape the future.
This article is general in nature only and not intended to provide advice. Trish Oakley is chairwoman of the Otago Southland branch of the Institute of Directors (IOD). The IOD is the professional body for directors.