我们想邀请汤普森将军和埃隆·马斯克登台。好的，大家早上好。埃隆今天能和我们聊大约30分钟。我很喜欢我们一整天都在听的配乐。我们听到了《火星救援》的主题曲或配乐、《星际穿越》的配乐，甚至还有《怪奇物语》的配乐。所以希望这稍微活跃了一下气氛，也希望大家都有机会参观展览，观看一些公开路演，以及参加今天一整天举行的一些专题讨论。我们今天的嘉宾无需介绍。在《福布斯》2019年创新榜单上，他与某位先生并列第一。

Jeff Bezos，如果你稍后愿意对此发表评论，你会有机会，不过我将对此保持沉默。显然，他创办了几家公司，你们可能都很熟悉，比如 Tesla Motors 和 SpaceX。他还曾在非营利机构 OpenAI 的董事会任职，并赞助了 Hyperloop 计划等创新竞赛。罗恩，非常感谢你今天和我们在一起。那么，除非有人对此有异议，否则我们就直接开始。我只有一些问题。我们将主要讨论创新，不过在有关创新的问题之间，也会穿插一些关于领导力的问题、关于文化的问题，特别是有关小企业成长为大企业这种环境的问题。而且我自己

直到5年前才开始遇到这些问题，不过我可能会问你几个工作与生活平衡方面的问题、生活质量方面的问题。那么不再耽搁，埃隆，所有企业在应对产品开发过程中的挑战时都会面临一个关键问题：我们是投入时间和资源在内部完成这项工作，还是将其外包并请外部合作伙伴与我们共同完成？你能不能稍微向观众谈谈，你在决定由自己的一家公司来做，还是外包给其他人时，会经历怎样的决策过程？好吧，起初我们试图把这些事情外包出去，但在 Tesla 和 SpaceX，我们一开始把大多数事情都外包了。这样没有成功，所以我们[音乐]……在太空供应链方面

并不好。ital 限制你只能真正与美国公司合作，通过太空火箭或认知技术与非美国公司合作非常困难。因此，我们可选择的供应商有限，而且通常你会得到传统部件，同时继承传统成本和限制。因此，这要求我们把火箭的大部分工作收回内部完成。到目前为止，可能只有不到10%的火箭来自“太空我的链条”。汽车供应链要好一些，消费电子供应链要好得多。无论这种热爱竞争是什么，这些飞行链条都会更好。所以这实际上取决于具体部件。但重要的是，惰性部件、系带成本限制。如果你想要某种革命性的东西，就不能采用目录工程。是的，目录工程

……所以，传统工业基础无法足够快地适应你想做的事，于是你将其内部化。在这种内部化过程中，有没有什么特殊技巧或文化层面的做法，是你发现，或者我们发现，对 Tesla 或 SpaceX 尤其有益的？好吧，不只是这样。比如，如果你想推动技术进步，就必须招募世界上最优秀的工程师，然后创造一种环境，让他们能够尽可能地创新。所以在奖励机制上，你知道，你需要真正奖励和鼓励创新，并惩罚缺乏创新。因此，这显然……这是第二个特征。[音乐]风险与回报不对称：大胆行动如果出了问题就会受到惩罚，但只是低着头不出头却不会受到惩罚，而这并不好

，那会导致保守。所以必须取得重大进展，而仅仅是没有做出重大成果这件事，就应该让人感觉不好。所以，是的，这种情况随着时间推移只会变得非常保守。从极限意义上说，政府其实就是一家公司。所以……公司。是的。我们的观众中有一些大公司，但也有很多小企业。因此，他们并非火箭传统供应链的一部分，或者不属于你所关联的某家公司可能生产的其他任何创新产品的传统供应链。对于这么多小企业，你能否提供一些建议或意见，告诉它们如何向 SpaceX 等不断发展的太空合作伙伴，或其他可能愿意让它们进入供应链的公司推介自己，前提是它们没有那种旧的

思维或旧的流程心态？好吧，基本上以 Tesla 为例，我是说，如果有人有一种比我们自己制造的部件更好的部件，我们当然非常乐意把它买回来，肯定如此。只要把原本研发那个部件的资源重新分配去做其他事情即可。所以我把你放到着陆腿上，它们被外包给 Racing 赛车。你们今天做得很好，比我们做得更好，所以我们在研究别的东西。因此，这绝不意味着，比如说，如果外部有一个重要的虚拟5可用，我们还想继续在内部自行制造这个部件，那将完全是疯狂的。所以我们很乐意把它做得比 SpaceX 更好，然后他们会想和你谈。好的，埃隆，鉴于你在非营利领域的丰富经验，比如我提到的 OpenAI 之类的公司

，以及你通过 Hyperloop 竞赛之类的项目接触学术环境中前沿创新的能力，对于现场这些人，也就是这个太空专业人士群体而言，有没有什么聪明的方法，可以让他们与生态系统中不同的创新来源建立联系？我们怎样才能更好地培育这些创新来源，以便在我国的太空能力中利用它们？嗯，是的，说起 OpenAI，我不会说自己是非营利组织方面的专家，但 OpenAI 的真正目的是降低通用人工智能的风险。我希望它……我希望它确实在做这件事。它也有一定概率放大了风险，但希望它降低了风险。现在我有一个基金会，会捐出

……我不是这方面的专家。我主要想做的是找出哪些行动能够提高未来变得美好的概率，然后参加选举。好的，这很棒，确实如此。好的，那么，你个人是否使用什么方法来识别信息来源？我的意思是，这是否仅仅是阅读，或者观察外面有什么？你的公司或私人生活中是否会持续进行市场调研，了解外面有什么是我应该赞助或加以利用的，以便让事情比现在更好？我完全不做任何市场调研。好的。就像卡尔，很棒的火箭，你知道，就像，好吧，我们见过的火箭或汽车的柏拉图式理念具备哪些特征？然后把它造出来，然后

我发现，如果你这么做，人们就会买它，好的，就是这样。你知道，我们会推出皮卡，或者说很酷的 Cybertruck。我的意思是，它看起来像个杏仁人，我会从你那里延续过来，当然，是的，其他人也会这么做。它看起来会像电影片场里的电缆。好的，我期待未来某个时候看到它。要努力制造你认为别人会喜欢、而且你自己也喜欢的产品。如果你不喜欢这个产品，就不该指望其他人会喜欢。好的，很好。那么从领导力角度看，显然你最初是一家小企业的领导者，后来把多家小企业发展成了大型企业。那么从早期在 Zip2 和 PayPal 的日子算起，你当时领导的是非常非常小的开发团队，有时

还亲自动手完成大量开发工作，到今天——今天，因为你需要 Tesla Motors 和 SpaceX 这样非常大的公司，你的领导方式发生过变化吗？还是说，你会像管理那些小团队一样，努力在整个组织中保持相同的文化和领导风格？嗯，随着公司变大，这肯定必须改变。Tesla 大约有45,000人，SpaceX 接近7,000人。你知道，公司规模较小时，你的技能有点像这样：一名工程师个人就能产生非常大的影响。一家咖啡馆很大时，你必须教很多人去做。是的，你必须成为一个力量倍增器，而不是说，如果你有一支小队，比如十几个剑士之类的，进入你的一天。所以这就

好吧，对，你可以——那会在一场小规模战斗中产生影响，但如果是12,000人就不行了。所以你必须设法大规模地教导人们采用不同的方法，并确保正确的行为、合理的结构，以及设定正确的名称，这些都极其重要。经济学101：无论你激励什么，它都很可能发生。事实上，如果没有发生，反而会很奇怪。所以从统计学上讲，那肯定就是会发生的事情。因此，整个结构必须合理。这听起来非常显而易见，但在大多数组织中，他们想要这样，这意味着结构并不正确。嗯哼，好的。那么随着企业发展，就像你的企业已经经历的那样，工作越来越不再是工程师在非常小的团队环境里与项目经理一对一交谈，

而是变成企业内部不同团队之间的对话，涉及规模大得多的人群。在许多组织里，似乎会形成一些衔接处，而领导者必须管理这些衔接处，或者坚持要求自己的团队管理这些衔接处。你是如何管理目前所领导的大型企业中的这些衔接处的？在任何一款产品中，你都能看到组织层面的错误如何体现在产品错误上。比如，你可以看到，你知道，我在产品中看到这种情况：电池有一个顶盖，而汽车上又有一个底盖。好的，我们应该只有一个盖子，不需要盒子套盒子。但这里有电池团队，还有车架和车身团队，所以他们

各自做了一个盖子。你知道，你会看到各种凸缘、接缝和其他没有意义的东西，或者重复设置的东西；我们得到的是子系统优化中的系统优化。为了抵消这种情况——这并不容易——我实际上会坚持要求团队踩到彼此的脚趾。如果推进或发动机团队必须部分进入飞机的范围，飞机团队也必须部分进入发动机的范围，就是这样。但这很热，很热，如果你现在这么做的话。所以本质上，他们基本上必须冒犯公司里的其他人，并结束自己。好的，努力传播这一点非常重要：每个人都应该是总工程师。每个人，每个人都至少应该对整枚火箭、整辆汽车有一个粗略的了解，即使

他们可能在某一个领域拥有深厚的专业知识，他们制造，他们建造，以判断自己是否在为整个产品进行优化。所以最后，你可以概括每个学科的关键特征；可以把它简化为几项原则。就像理查德·海因德曼常说的，如果你能向一个聪明的十岁孩子解释某个主题，你才算真正了解它。但如果你试图用晦涩的语言掩饰所谓的专业知识，那么对于从轨道返回的火箭，你会谈到萨拉压力和质心，听起来非常复杂，但基本上你只是有一个舞蹈大致相等的跷跷板。[音乐] 它就是这样：如果你把质量放在一侧，它就会让那一只脚向外倾斜；放到另一侧，就会向另一边倾，就是

像你看到的那样。所以接着我们会看质量分布是否合理，哪里不合理。嗯，襟翼在某一侧太大了，或者另一侧太大了。还有很多其他例子，但我认为原则是，每个人都应该对粒子有更广泛的了解。对，就是这样。那么除了让团队普遍具备广泛理解的文化，以及不要过分担心冒犯其他团队人员的文化，以便展开那些艰难的讨论，你知道，不让风险向下游传递，并尽早发现问题之外，在把小企业发展成大企业的过程中，从文化角度而言，还有哪些方面对你和你的领导团队，或者

对你的全体员工特别重要？我不能说自己像是——我还不错，但不确定自己是否真的把自己看作非常出色的专家。今晚你的节目我会去。你知道，我们做得还可以，但看起来犯了很多错误，我只能这么说。所以，你知道，我会尽可能使用物理学的工具。你知道，我成长过程中其实考虑过从事物理学事业，比如去克莱德之类的地方。我认为自己本来也不会成为最好的摄影师。嗯，来自一种重视领导力的文化，我的观点是，除非你具备那种领导能力，否则就无法取得成果；而我们取得成果时当然也是如此。是的，别妄自菲薄，这就是我要说的。[音乐] 好吧，

对，所以，你应该始终假设你自己是错的，而你的目标是少错一点。这是一种非常重要的思维方式。人们往往会假设自己是对的，并寻找证据证明自己正确。你肯定在某种程度上是错的，问题是错了多久，以及明天能不能少错一点。好的，所以与其从亚伯拉罕·林肯或其他人那里学习领导力，不如从物理学世界中学习领导力。是的，物理学的思维结构可以得到广泛应用，这是正确的。它们令人惊叹，其中包含量子力学和广义相对论等各种反直觉的东西。所以这些都是非常棒的工具。好的，好吧，我们会在这场活动之后安排教科书销售；或者现在就去 Khan Academy，上面有很多

很好的物理学内容。好的，埃隆，我们稍微换个话题，谈谈工作与生活的平衡。你是否会有意识地安排如何平衡工作与生活的其他部分？还是只是会感觉到，嘿，我现在太专注于工作了，需要休息一下，或者需要去做点不同的事？嗯，我想我可能会，但那种观点是我选择的决定。对我来说，我实际上可能会尽量完成最多的事情；但如果你不休息几次，那么你最终能完成的事情反而更少。[音乐] 我休息的原因基本上是为了完成更多事情。这是每个人的决定，但——行动要存储灵感——周末跑腿，因为它持续着。他们休假一段时间，去工作一周，而

我当时就想，嗯，大概是两千或两千家医院，所以也许我应该再休息一次，你知道。是的，但我想我大概不会建议同时经营两家公司。这不会带来最有趣的体验。明白，我明白，是的，我明白。那么大约一年前，你和我在一个星期六早上进行过一次交谈。我记得那次星期六早上的电话交谈中，我们最初大约花了15或20分钟，谈论各自在那个星期六早上刚刚做完的锻炼。你愿意稍微向观众讲讲自己如何保持体形吗？老实说，我觉得自己不是一个很好的副主席，不过保持思维状态的问题接下来再问。好的，听着，我为什么没有练出超级好的体形，不过，不过

我，这就像它看起来是对的，然后在跑步机上跑步。那差不多是我真正看电视的唯一时间，就是在拖车上跑15到20分钟。我读到那上面说，好的，跑步时在电视上看。我只希望今天下午晚些时候看《空中大灌篮》的任务，听《空中大灌篮》的原声带。好的，明白了，明白了。那这样问吧，我知道你阅读量很大，但从终身学习的角度来看，你一直在设法为自己的工具箱增加东西，从而成为，你知道，更好的领导者、更好的 CEO。对于观众如何做到这些、保持思维敏锐，你有什么建议吗？嗯，我现在真的很喜欢这些。我小时候一直都在读书。我的意思是，我主要订阅科学类

期刊。你知道，它们就像每日新闻一样。我觉得每日新闻里有很多噪声，而且非常负面，所以我通常尽量不怎么阅读每日新闻，因为一般来说，报纸似乎都在试图回答这个问题：今天地球上发生的最糟糕的事情是什么？[笑声] 每天都必定会发生某件糟糕的事情，那是一颗很大的大工厂。同样也会发生很棒的事情，但它们不回答那个问题。因此，每日新闻往往会让我的小机器人变得像科学家。科学和科技期刊很好，非常有趣，而且通常，你知道，如果有了某种发现，就会刊登在那里。所以，我还觉得 Twitter 很有启发性，意大利人，是的。不过在那里，和聪明的

人一直交谈非常有帮助，因为那可以提炼正在发生的有趣事情。你知道，当然也要努力询问别人，比如针对汽车，可以问：我们哪里做错了？他们什么时候来做爱会让它变得更好？通常我们总有一次是对的。你知道，就像我说的图表，但它哪里有问题？你会说，它的工作方式好得多。你知道，我们怎样才能少错一点？对，对，是的。好的，所以就是，别告诉我好的部分，那很酷，但要告诉我那些非常无聊的东西。好的，坏的东西。好的，好的。所以我们在空军采购部门也有类似的文化，会和操作人员交流：很好，你喜欢它，但告诉我们你现在不喜欢什么。好，那么这个领域，也就是太空

领域、今天在场的这个生态系统每天都面临的一项挑战，即使美国或整个自由世界的 STEM 人才培养体系完美无缺，也仍然会每天面对，那就是对人才的战略竞争。当你从小企业发展成大企业时，在如何接触并找到生态系统中的人才方面，所采用的技巧是否需要改变？是的，首先，如果你想获得优秀的工程人才，那么工作本身必须令人兴奋。最优秀的工程师希望从事最具创新性的工作。然后，当你把好东西加入公司时，他们反过来会招募其他优秀工程师，以及各种类型的人才。所以非常重要的一点是，

他们从事的事情本身必须有趣，而且，而且，而且要享受它；那里要有一个高能量的环境。如果工作本身有趣，他们也在取得进展，那么你就会自然而然吸引越来越多的绿色工程师。当你不再做真正有趣的事情时，他们就会离开。好的，这一点相当、相当直截了当。但当你找到某个人时，要确保你的招聘职能非常出色，而且如果某个优秀的人才想加入公司，他们确实能得到面试机会。这实际上是我很重视的一点：我来自一个昏迷讲述者，他今天以任何形式活着。如果不是，那就是我们做错了什么。而且我并不完全确定自己明白了。

你知道，所以如果一开始可能没明白，我们就应该解决它，并确保我们没有把人才挡在门外。是的，或者我们正在考察正确的东西。所以通常要寻找能够证明卓越能力的事情。我不会因为某个人从大学、高中或其他地方毕业就封装他。什么是卓越能力的证据？你只要给出三条要点，大学里卓越能力的证据并不算可以。好的，是的，但你知道，辩论投票、某种真正令人印象深刻的设备，以及某场非常非常艰难的比赛，提出过一些很棒的想法。所以是某种真正艰难的、很可能，你知道，就是他们做过的事情，能够清楚证明其卓越能力。它不一定是4。

0 GPA，没错，那很令人担忧，成为一个合同奥卡托。是的，有时候。好吧，对，卓越能力的明确证据。否则，我非常喜欢这一点。好的，所以伊拉娜，我想把最后一分钟左右交给你，你知道，让埃隆做埃隆，对吧？好的，所以你有——这是空军太空路演日——观众中有为太空领域开发新型创新能力的小企业，有空军太空司令部的操作人员、空军太空采购人员，有国会工作人员，有一些媒体，观众中还有硅谷的专家。关于空军太空路演日，以及如何成功发展一家小企业，你想告诉他们所有人的一件或两件事是什么……

一家大企业，你最想告诉他们哪一件或两件事？好的，嗯，我的意思是，如果我要说的话，我不认为把小企业发展到合乎逻辑的规模本身就是好事。有时体育企业就应该是一家小企业，有些企业根本不应该存在。微型公司是一群为了某个目的而聚集到一起的人，这个目的就是创造引人注目的产品或服务。如果产品或服务没有吸引力，但竞争确实存在，那么遗忘它的人就是卢浮宫。关键、关键、关键在于创造出色的产品或服务。而如果只有你一个人，就很难做到这一点，所以需要不止一个人。因此，不能为了扩大企业而扩大企业。你必须问：你试图解决的这个重要问题是什么，

它真正重要吗？然后努力解决它。就太空而言，我认为其实只有一个问题，主要只有一个问题，那就是完全且快速重复使用的火箭胜过火箭。这就是圣杯。你知道，从基本层面说，我们已经通过合理的吸管和公平朝这个方向取得了一些进展。但拥有可重复使用的火箭绝对意义深远，就像在诺雷尔领域拥有可重复使用的交通工具一样。自行车、飞机、汽车、部队都已经可以重复使用。所以，你知道，如果比较成本，像一架普洛特普洛特的 PC-12 单引擎涡桨飞机，载荷约为1次，售价500万美元；一架747的载荷超过100条舌头，而你可以

以50万美元租它从服务地飞往悉尼再返回。因此，在运输成本和每吨运输成本上相差1000倍，而且那种胀气实际上无法抵达澳大利亚，所以我们没有到达那里。所以我要说的是，一艘小型、巨型的可重复使用飞行器，它的成本只占很小的感官；如果你只需要废除某样东西，就会容易很多。所以，你知道，当我说它看起来像许多火箭完全启动时，我认为这是奥布里的身体所涉及的一件事。就是这样。你知道，串扰震动计划雄心勃勃得像欧芹一样。燃料和氧气的成本，以及它是一个党派减压器，迪士尼的百万，也就是大约$900,000的光。所以这东西将以可使用的$900,000，用于某个重达数吨的东西，

至少达到100吨，很可能是时间，而你应该考虑我们的运行成本，即机会、卡玛戈及其后果。但它甚至比一枚微型火箭便宜得多。所以关键就是历史创造的东西，但这是缓慢前进的火箭，仍然有用，只是较小的桶。比如那里只有720个寂静，那里有预言，你知道，它们是常见的尺寸，而且都可以重复使用。如果你创办一家汽车公司，一家一次性汽车公司会穿什么？是的，谁都会说，嗯，那非常可笑。你知道，它的好处是，你必须带着起落架起飞，然后一直飞到油箱耗尽，看看额外航程板，接着用降落伞把 COG 扔出去，飞机就坠毁了。而这就是，这就是

这就是火箭的工作方式，太疯狂了。嗯，我谨代表巴拉克斯部长、博士。

罗珀、我本人以及整个空军采购团队，感谢你今天来到这里。各位，埃隆·马斯克。

we would like to invite general Thompson and Elon Musk to the stage all right well good morning everybody we got about 30 minutes with Elon here I love the soundtrack that we're listening to you throughout the day we've got the theme or the soundtrack to the Martian the soundtrack dinner cellar even the soundtrack to the stranger things so hopefully that has lightened the mood a little and hopefully you all had the opportunity to enjoy the expo some of the public pitches and some of the panel sessions that have occurred throughout the day our guest today needs no introduction in the forbes innovation list for 2019 he was code number one on that list with mr.

Jeff Bezos and if you care to comment on that later you'll have the opportunity but I will remain silent on that he's obviously the founder of a few companies you may all be familiar with like Tesla Motors and SpaceX he's also spent time on the board of a non-profit open AI and sponsored innovative competitions like the Hyperloop initiative Ron thank you so much for being with us today so we'll just dive right in unless anybody has any objections to that I just have some questions we're going to be talking about primarily innovation but interspersed amongst some of our questions on innovation would be some questions on leadership some questions on culture and especially in the small business growing to a large business kind of environment and then I myself

never got these questions until five years ago but I may throw you a couple work-life balance questions quality of life questions so without further ado Ilan a critical question that all businesses face when tackling challenges during product development is do we invest the time and the resources to do this work internally or do we contract it out and have an external partner do it with us can you talk to the audience a little bit about what kind of decision process you go through whether you're deciding to do it in one of your companies or contract it out to somebody else well in the beginning we try to contract those things out but at Tesla and SpaceX we start with with most things contracted out what didn't succeed so we [Music] in space supply chain

is not great ital restricts you to really working with us companies which very difficult work with non-us companies via space rockets or awareness technology so we have a limited set of suppliers and typically that you have legacy parts you inherit the legacy costs and limitations and so that required us to insource most of the rocket this probably only what less than 10% of the rocket is coming from the space my chain at this point the automotive supply chain is better consumer electronics is a lot better whatever this love competition these fly chain is better so it really depends on the part but it's important that lazy components lacing cost limitations if you won't have something revolutionary you can't do catalog engineering yeah catalog engineering

is so the legacy industrial base isn't able to adapt fast enough to Wired what you're trying to do so you in source it are there any special techniques or cultural aspects of that in sourcing that you find we found to be particularly beneficial in Tesla or SpaceX well it wasn't just like if you want to advance technology you've got a recruit the world's best engineers and then create environment which enables them to his innovative as possible so the reward structure you know you need to really reward and encourage innovation and punish lack of innovation so it's got oboz this is the second characteristic [Music] risk reward asymmetry bold moves are if they go wrong punished and but sort of keeping your head down is is not punished but that's not good

that will result in conservative so it has to be significant advancement and simply the lack of doing something significant feels bad so yeah this is just become really conservative over time and really the government is a company in the limit so company yeah so we have some big companies in the audience but we have a lot of small businesses in the audience so not part of if you will the legacy supply chain for rockets or whatever other innovation you were a company that you're associated with might be producing is there some advice or counsel that you could give to so many small businesses about how to market to growing space partnerships like SpaceX or other companies that might be willing to admit them to the supply chain if they don't have that old

think or that old process mentality well basics for Tesla I mean if somebody's got a component that's better than what we're making totally love to buy back for sure just reallocate the resources that were working on that component to do something else so I put you up on the landing legs and they were contracted out to Racing racing cars you did a good job today better than us so we working on things so this is by no means like it would be completely insane for us to want to continue to make it part ourselves internally there's a virtual 5 that is available externally that matters so we'd love to do it better than SpaceX then they'd like to talk to you ok Elon given your extensive experience in the nonprofit arena with companies like open AI that I mentioned

in the introduction and your ability to tap into the academic environment that cutting edge innovation in our environment with things like the Hyperloop competition are there smart ways for the folks in the audience this community of space professionals to be engaging with different sources of innovation in the ecosystem how do we better cultivate those sources of innovation so that we can take advantage of them in our nation's space capabilities well yeah in overnight I wouldn't sound like an expert in nonprofits but opening I was really intended to mitigate the risk of artificial general intelligence I hope that it I hope that that's where it does the song chance of me amplified the risk but hopefully it reduces risk now I have foundation that gives

away the ONC an expert on this mostly trying to do is figure out the set of actions that increase the probability of the future is good and take elections okay that's great really okay so is there are there techniques that you personally use to identify sources of information I mean is it is it just reading or seeing what's out there they have the continuous market research going on in your companies or in your private life about what's out there that I should be sponsoring or taking advantage of to make things better than we are I do I do zero market research whatsoever okay just like Carl great rocket you know it's like okay like where's the Platonic idea we've seen the perfect Rockets or car what characteristics would have and then make that and then

to I find that if you do that people buy it okay and it's that's and you know we're gonna come out with the pickup truck or the cool cyber truck I mean it looks like an almond person I'll carry over from you sure yeah it's like other people do too it's gonna look like a cable from movie set okay I look forward to seeing it at some point in the future try to make products that they think others would love they don't love themselves if you don't love the product you should not expect that others will okay great so from a leadership perspective obviously you started as a leader of a small business and grew a number of small businesses into large businesses so from your early days that at zip2 and PayPal leading very very small teams of developers sometimes

doing a lot of the development yourself hands-on today - today as you need very large companies like Tesla Motors and SpaceX has your leadership approach changed at all or is managing those small teams to try and keep that culture and your leadership style the same throughout well it definitely has to as companies get bigger Tesla's around 45,000 people and SpaceX is almost 7,000 people and you know when a company is little then your skill as is sort of that like an individual engineer can a very big difference one Cafe is large you have to kind of teach a lot of people to do it yet you have to you have to be a force multiplier as opposed to like if you have a little band like if you know if you like a dozen swordsmen or something into your day so it's

okay right you can that's gonna make a difference in a little battle but not if it was 12,000 like you so you have to try to teach people on mass different approaches and just make sure that the right behavior what structure is in setting the right name is incredibly important economics 101 whatever you incent it is likely to happen in fact would be bizarre if it didn't so statistically speaking will definitely be what happens so the entire structure must be sensible and this sounds very obvious but in most organizations they want this means the structure isn't right mm-hmm okay so as businesses grow as your businesses have grown and it becomes less and less about the engineer talking to the program manager one-on-one in a very small team environment

and it becomes conversations between different teams in your enterprise much larger groups of people there's in many organizations there's a tendency that seems will develop and if leaders have to manage those seems how or insist that their teams manage those seems how have you managed the seams and the large businesses that you manage currently in any given product you can see that mistake the organizational errors manifest themselves and the errors in the product so you can see like the you know and I see the scenario products it's like a top cover of the battery and we've got a bottom cover on the car okay that's we should only have one cover no need a box in the box but there's the bathroom team and the chat and the body of chances little and so they

made a cover you know see sort of flanges and joints and various things did not make sense or things are doubled up and we have subsystem optimization in system optimization so to counteract that which is not easy I actually it insist that teams step on each other's toes so if propulsion to the engine team has to go part way into the airplane and the airplane team has to go part way into the engine it's just but it's hot it's hot if you were to do that now and so essentially they have to basically offend other people in the company and ended themselves ok this is very important to try to propagate is that everyone should be chief engineer like everyone everyone should have at least a inside cursory understanding of the whole rocket the whole car even

though they may have deep expertise in one arena they make they built to tell if if they're optimizing from for the product as a whole so I finally you can summarize the key characteristics of they have each discipline you can simplify it down to a few principles there's like you're Richard Hyndman needs to say that really know your subject if you can explain it to a smart ten-year-old but if you try to sort of disguise or expertise obscure language then rockets coming back from orbits you have like Sara pressure and center of mass and it sounds very complicated but basically you just have a seesaw of approximately equal dance [Music] it's it's just gonna be if you put mass on one side it's gonna tip that one foot outside and took the other way and just

like you see so then like we'll see the mass distribution even make sense what doesn't make sense well the flaps are too big on one side or the other plenty of other examples but I think principle is that everyone should kind of have a broader understanding of the particles and that's that's right so other than so other than the culture of broad understanding amongst your teams and the culture of don't worry too much about offending people on other team is to make those difficult kind of discussions to you know not travel risk downstream and identify issues early are there other aspects especially in growing your small businesses into large businesses that have been really important from a culture perspective for either you and your leadership team or

for your entire workforce I can't say I'm like I'm like good but I'm not sure if it really view myself is so great great expert on your show tonight I will go you know we're doing okay but let's see some just seems like a lot of mistakes was born I can say so you know I try to use the tools of physics as much as possible you know when I was growing up I was actually thinking of a career in physics I'd like the Clyde or something like that and I don't think I've been a best photographer well coming from coming from a culture that values leadership my position is that you don't achieve results and certainly when we have achieved results unless you have that kind of leadership skill yeah mon-sol so don't sell yourself short is what I'm saying [Music] all

right so with that is like you should always assume that you're yourself and your goal is to be less wrong this is very one frame of mind people tend to assume that their rights and there was proof that they're right you're definitely wrong some degree the question is how long and can you be less wrong tomorrow okay so instead of leadership lessons from Abraham Lincoln or somebody else leadership lessons from the world of physics yes the thought constructs of physics can be applied broadly this is the right they're amazing they got all these counterintuitive things like quantum mechanics and general relativity so these these great tools okay all right we'll have a textbook sale later after our session or for those right now just hit Khan Academy up lots

of good stuff on there on physics okay so Elon let's move on a little bit to work-life balance do you have a deliberate approach to how you balance your work and the rest of your life or do you just kind of have a sense of hey I am focusing way too much on work right now I need a break or I need to go do something different well I think I might but that point of view is what I select decision there in my case I actually might get the most amount done possible but if you don't take some breaks then you're sort of not being get done is less [Music] the reason I take breaks in order to get more done basically was what everyone's decision but - actions to a storage inspire - weekend errand as it was lasting they had a vacation region to work for a week and

I was like well like two thousand or two thousand hospital so maybe I should take another break you know yeah but I think it's probably I would not recommend running to companies this is this does not make for the most fun understand I understand yeah I understand so about a year ago you and I had a conversation on a Saturday morning and what the thing that I remember from the Saturday morning telephone conversation was we spent about the first 15 or 20 minutes talking about the workouts that we had just had on that Saturday morning would you care to tell the audience a little bit about how you stay in shape I don't think I'm a good vice chair to be honest but the mentally in shape question is next okay listen why don't become in superbe shape but but

I this is just like it looked rights and run on a treadmill and that's like the one time that I really watched television was like running for 15 to 20 minutes on a trailer I read that said okay watching on television when you're running I just wish watching Space Jam quest for a Space Jam soundtrack later this afternoon okay gotcha gotcha how about I know you're a huge reader but from a a lifelong learning perspective constantly trying to add to your toolkit so that you're you know a better leader a better CEO are there recommendations that you have for the audience about those kinds of things that you to keep yourself mentally sharp well I really like these days and I used to when I was a kid I was read all the time I mean mostly subscribed to scientific

periodicals like you know they're like the the Daily News I find a lot of noise and just very negative so I generally try to not read the daily news a little that much because they're jelly newspapers try to seem to be trying to answer the question what is the worst thing that happened on earth today [Laughter] something terrible happened every single day guarantee was a big big plant also something great happened but don't answer that question so that's the daily news just tends to make my little robot like scientists science and tech technology periodicals are good quite interesting and usually you know that if there's something something discovering the it'll be in there so and I find Twitter enlightening Italians yeah but there and talking to smart

people all the time is very helpful because that can be a distillation of a of interesting things that are going on and you know certainly like to try to ask people like for the car like what are we doing wrong when they were coming sex will make better usually one time we all it's right you know like the chart I'm saying but what's wrong with it you're like working way better you know like how do we be less wrong right right yeah okay so it's like don't tell me the good stuff like that's cool but tell me about stuff that's very bored okay bad things okay okay so we we have a similar culture and air force acquisition talking to our operators about well that's great that you love it but tell us what don't you like right now so so this domain the space

domain this ecosystem that's represented today one of the challenges that it faces every day it would face every day even if the if the stem production system across the United States or across the free world was perfect is a strategic competition for talent are there techniques that as you grow from a small business to a large business they need to change in terms of how you reach out and find that talent in the ecosystem yeah first of all like the things that if you want to get great engineering talent then you it work itself has to be exciting the best engineers want to work on the most innovative things and then as you add goodies just the company they will in turn recruit other great engineers and talents of all kinds so it is very important that

it be that the thing they're working on is intrinsically interesting and and and Joe it that it there's a high energy environment if the work is intrinsically interesting and interesting and the they're making progress then it just you just sort of attract more more green engineers when you stop doing really interesting things then they leave okay and that's that's the they're pretty pretty straightforward but you get what someone out make sure you but a recruiting function that is that is very good and that if if somebody great wants to join the company that they actually get an interview this is actually one of my big wise is I came from a coma teller was alive today in any way if not we're doing something wrong and like I'm not totally sure get it

you know so if maybe not get it early we should fix that and and make sure we're not like barring the doors from talent yeah or they were we're looking at the right thing so general look for things that are like evidence of exceptional ability I on capsule me graduate from college or high school or whatever what evidence is exceptional ability you just give you three bullet points evidence an exceptional ability from college is not as okay yeah but you know the debate vote some really impressive device and some tough really tough competition come up with some great ideas so some really tough probably you know it's like what they do that just was like clear evidence of exceptional ability it's not necessarily a 4.

0 GPA that's right that's concerning to be a contract occator yeah sometimes okay well right clear evidence of exceptional ability otherwise I like that a lot okay so Ilana I want to give you the the last minute or so for you know for Elon to be Elon right okay so you have which this is an Air Force Space pitch day you have in the audience small businesses developing new and innovative capabilities for the space domain you have Air Force Space Command operators Air Force space acquisition folks you have congressional staffers you have some Media you've got experts in the valley in the audience what is the one thing or two things that you want to tell them all about air force space pitch day and how it is to be successfully growing a small business to

a large business okay well I mean if I got I don't think that's like it's intrinsically good to grow a small business to logicals and sometimes the sport business should be a small business sometimes businesses shouldn't exist and micro companies as a group of people I collected together for a purpose which is to create a compelling product or service if that product or service is not compelling that competition exists but that's louvers who forget to it it's it's it's the point is to create a great product or service and then if you're just one person that it's hard to do that more than one person so it's not about growing a business for the sake of growing a business you have to say like what what is this important problem that you're trying to solve

that really matters and then go try to solve that it with respect to space I think there's really just one problem one problem primarily which is the fully and rapidly reusable rocket over rocket this is the this is the Holy Grail you know it's basics we've made some progress in this direction with the reasonable straw and the fair but it's it's absolutely profound to have a reusable rocket as would be to have it as list as is to have reusable transport Norrell domains their bicycles aircraft cars forces are already usable so and you know if you look at the cost comparison something like a plot plot is pc-12 a single-engine turboprop has a payload of about one time and costs five million dollars a 747 has a payload of over a hundred tongues and you can

lease it for a flight from services go to Sydney and back for half a million dollars so that that is a thousand full difference in cost and cost a ton of transport and actually that flatus can't reach Australia so we didn't get there so what I say is a small a giant reusable craft it costs a small the sensories if you just need to repeal something is that quite easier so you know what when I say like looks like a lot of rockets start absolutely and I think this is one thing that is Aubree's body that's it you know crosstalk shook program which is parsley pretty ambitious that the cost of fuel and oxygen and it's a partisan depressurizes Disney's million which is very is about $900,000 light so thing is going to usable $900,000 before something with tons

to at least a hundred tons probably of time and you should consider our operation costly the opportunity Camargo consequent so but it was much less than even a tiny rocket and so it's the thing is the thing that history made but this is slowly is go rock and still be useful just a smaller buckets like there are only 720 silence there are prophecies you know they're popular sizes they're all reusable and if you stopping that a car company what would wear a single-use a car company yes who would say well that's pretty funny and you know though the plus side is that you need to take off with your landing gear and and you run until your tanks are dry see of extra range plate and then you drop the COG out with a parachute and the plane crashes and that's that's

that's how Rockets work it was crazy well I'm on on behalf of secretary barracks dr.

Roper and myself and the entire Air Force acquisition team thank you for joining us here today everybody Elon Musk