Elon Musk: I'm neither a samurai nor a bastard

Elon Musk has come out fighting online to defend his reputation after quotes in a new book about the space and electric car enthusiast made him look like a bit of a git. The claims come in a new book, Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, written by El Reg alumnus Ashlee Vance. The book claims that …

[Anonymous Coward]

No problem

"Besides those specific accusations, however, Musk doesn't seem to have much of a problem with the new book..."

So the rest of the book contains no more vicious slurs? Only the one about him tormenting employees, just because he can? Were I him, I wouldn't care much about the rest either.

[Anonymous Coward]

Musk is overreacting

Elon spends most of his time trying to garner attention, and now that someone writes a book about him, he hits the panic button and takes to Twitter to defend himself.. hilarious.

I don't much like the guy, but these quotes hardly seem newsworthy or even that negative. Musk is just triggering a Cassandra effect with his denials.

Regarding the hours worked - this is a byproduct of industrial-age thinking - when a company starts watching how many hours you spend on the job and publicly shames those that go outside the sweatshop walls, it encourages clock-punchers, and eventually scares off creative thinkers, your most valuable employees.

[Spleen]

Re: Musk is overreacting

Streisand effect, surely. A Cassandra effect would mean nobody believing Musk's denials even though he's telling the truth.

[Anonymous Coward]

US management - confusing hours worked for productivity

Dickheads

[JDX]

Re: US management - confusing hours worked for productivity

Anyone who has ever started there own business knows that working every hour available DOES have benefits, The "working extra hours doesn't improve productivity" dogma only applies to people who are told to do so - especially if they're not compensated for it. If you care about what you're working on, that's a different story.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: US management - confusing hours worked for productivity

Anyone who has worked in a startup knows that while there are times extra effort is needed, if the owners and staff are spending all the hours working, they are doing it wrong. People who work long hours become less creative because they have less incremental effort available to deal with new challenges.

In Moby-Dick, Ishmael comments on the stupidity of the whalers. The harpooneer is expected to show an example as the hardest rower. But that means that when he stands up to throw his harpoon he is near exhaustion and many whales are missed because of this. He says tha the harpooner should rise to his task from idleness so he can make the critical effort.

This in a nutshell shows what is wrong with the mindset in many small businesses - and large ones - the belief that people can provide 100% effort all the time. They cannot. I have seen too many startup owners unable to take in what is being said in meetings through sheer fatigue, and meetings insanely prolonged trying to get staff to take things on board when they are mentally dulled. And plenty of really bad late night code for that matter, which takes longer to fix than it did to write.

Final example; General Wenck. Hitler lost a battle in WW2 because Wenck was expected to return to headquarters every night to attend Hitler's rambling situation conferences. As a result Wenck became so fatigued that he fell asleep while driving (his chauffeur already being exhausted) and had a serious accident. (Wenck by the way was a "good German" who sabotaged Hitler's scorched earth policy at the end of the war - perhaps the most intelligent of Hitler's generals. And Hitler nearly killed him by pointless make work.)

[Spleen]

Re: US management - confusing hours worked for productivity

"In Moby-Dick, Ishmael comments on the stupidity of the whalers. The harpooneer is expected to show an example as the hardest rower. But that means that when he stands up to throw his harpoon he is near exhaustion and many whales are missed because of this."

Ah, so it's like how Dimitar Berbatov is a much better striker than Jonathan Walters. In case anyone wanted a less classical analogy.

[Richard Taylor 2]

Re: US management - confusing hours worked for productivity

Who are they?

[Infernoz]

Re: US management - confusing hours worked for productivity

There is a rather nasty effect called "Diminishing Returns" which not only means that you become less productive as you get tired, but can easily flip to negative productivity with avoidable mistakes which you then have to spend extra time fixing later (if you notice them in-time and can figure out a fix) *, get stressed (can harm health), and reduce your creativity because you are working so hard that you body and brain don't have enough down time to digest problems and devise solutions. This only gets worse as you get older!

* If you don't notice tiredness caused mistakes, the cost to fix them can quickly escalate, especially if built into a product; this a well know gotcha in software development and engineering.

Caffeine should be used in moderation too, because it is quite a crude stimulant which will bite you when abused.

There is also something called a work life balance where you should recognise that you work enough to finance your life, not live to work, the later is pointless and will harm you even if you like your work.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: US management - confusing hours worked for productivity

That's insulting to Dicks. Penises are well aware that short bursts of effort are the key to creativity.

[TomMariner]

Re: US management - confusing hours worked for productivity

Mesmerized that a single word post that relies on the title, gets the most up votes and the most intelligent replies.

A lesson.

[Dan Paul]

The fallacy of "productivity"

Many business owners, particularly the self made ones; are famous for their "drive". I have personally heard things that would make your hair curl and then fall out. So called 'productivity" is the biggest lie perpetrated on employees.

The fact is that it is often the fault of certain employee's trying to agrandize themselves to management, that are the root cause of the problem. There are too many 'Suck ups" and "Yes Men" who devalue themselves and others by working for free.

Full time employment is 40 hours a week. Working 60 hours and not getting paid for 20 of them is the reason why people burn out and drop dead at their desks. Nobody can pay me enough to want to die for the company anymore. Working even more than 60 hours is the very definition of insane.

"At will" employment should be a thing of the past.

Productivity should be judged on quality not on quantity. Demands like the one from Musk or Gates are part of the reason that people are still unemployed. From now on, I'll check any prospective employers parking lot on the weekend and if there any cars there, I'll go somewhere else.

I for one would like to see overtime made illegal if required longer than 6 weeks. It should not be offered if there are any unemployed in the area.

Realistically, the legal definition of full time employment should be reduced to 32 hours/week and full health benefits should be paid pretax in full by the employer by the time the employee works more than 24 hours/week. MINIMUM VACATION should be 3 actual weeks (7 Days each) and should be fully paid.

This would do several things, like increase wages, decrease unemployment, balance workloads and in general make the quality of life better for employees everywhere. Not to mention the increase in service sector jobs needed to accommodate extra shifts and supervisory positions needed to manage more employee's. The increase in expendable income would more than pay for itself through other taxes. People would be happier and do better work.

That is the true measure of "productivity".

[Sgt_Oddball]

Re: The fallacy of "productivity"

That sounds like communism! </sarcasm>

[Graham Marsden]

@Sgt_Oddball - Re: The fallacy of "productivity"

Of course, as the Russians used to say "As long as they pretend to pay us, we'll pretend to work".

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: The fallacy of "productivity"

Yes my employer has their drive and the we are all in this working together for the company to grow attitude, including complete intrusion into private life with phone calls, expecting you to check your mails etc, because they work hard and so they expect everyone else in the company to do so, and how tough it is for them because they pay themselves only 16K.

It easy to say we are all in it together and we need to put in the hours, haven't seen them share out some of that philosophy when it comes to wages since some of the staff here are on 13K (and should be paid more for the hours and skill set).

*Of course wage wise then they are paying themselves 16K, because then tax on dividends (3-4K a month each for them and spouse) is deferred/paid by company, plus the big car whose wheels cost more than some employees monthly wages, phone, etc etc.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: The fallacy of "productivity"

I work for an American company in the UK. The company asks each new hire to opt out of the European Working Hours directive. This directive states that an employer can't force its employees to work more than an average of 48 hours per week over 3 months. So effectively our company wants to have the option of a 5 day week plus. I suspect this is the norm.

[Anonymous Coward]

Not an actual rebuttal?

Not sure if I'm parsing this too closely, but the claim

"Musk threw a fit when one of his SpaceX staff took a day off to attend the birth of his child."

isn't contradicted by

"It is total BS ... to claim that I told a guy to miss his child's birth just to attend a company meeting."

The claim in the book is that he threw a fit _after_ the guy missed the meeting, not that Musk ordered him to attend the meeting _before_ the child's birth.

[frank ly]

Re: Not an actual rebuttal?

It's the opposite of plea bargaining. You plead not guilty to a more serious charge that you make up.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Not an actual rebuttal?

Never assign to malice that which can be assigned to incompetence.

I had a manager fail to read a request for paternity leave correctly, and comment that it wasn't a very convenient time of year for me to request 2 weeks (unpaid) leave. He was OK with the request once he'd re-read it...

[disgruntled yank]

Special Forces

Just for laughs, I had a look at the US Military pay charts (available at http://www.dfas.mil/militarymembers/payentitlements/military-pay-charts.html). According the chart of January 1, 2015, the lowest-paid enlisted grade gets $1546 per month after four months of service. The highest grade on the chart (major general/rear admiral) get $12827 per month with over 18 years of service, roughly an 8-to-1 ratio over the E1. A four-star general or admiral is limited to $15125 per month.

Do Mr. Musk's enterprises display a comparably narrow spread in compensation from top to bottom?

[FrankAlphaXII]

Re: Special Forces

Keep in mind, the Special Forces only recruit men that are Specialists who are promotable (E-4P) or Sergeants (E-5) with one exception that I'm not at all sure that the Army's doing anymore, where you enlist as an 18X Special Forces Candidate, go to Fort Benning for Infantry OSUT or Fort Leonard Wood for Combat Engineer OSUT, do Airborne School at Fort Benning, and then go to Fort Bragg for Special Forces Assessment and Selection and the Q Course. It takes two years of very specialized classroom training at the DLIFLC in California after you pass selection and the Q course also, and thats the part that kept me out of SF. I have a very hard time learning to speak foreign languages.

The attrition rate is like 70% overall for them. Other Special Operations Forces (this is a distinct thing from Special Forces, in the Army SOF is everything from 1SFOD-D to Orange to Det-A/39th Special Forces Detachment, the 75th Ranger Regiment, to the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment to Civil Affairs and Psychological Operations, but also includes the Special Forces Command) have higher washout rates actually. I've heard of Delta not selecting anyone in the past for instance.

Special Forces and most SOF also get several other types of pay and allowances that DFAS isn't listing on the basic pay chart, like Hazardous Duty/forward area pay, Airborne Pay, Language pay, Basic Allowance for Subsistence, Basic Allowance for Housing, and some others.

[Anonymous Coward]

Work smarter, not harder

It's an annoying trope, but that doesn't mean it's wrong.

I've worked 60 hour weeks for a large, well-known software company.

Problem is, at least 2/3 of that time was wasted completely. I was working on products and features that were designed by management and "designers" and anybody with half a brain knew the stuff was doomed to failure the instant it hit usability testing.

If management paid any attention to engineering, we could have all been working 20 hour weeks and had the same output.

[CherylWillBounceBack]

I'm disappointed with Musk for distancing himself from that quote. I'm totally of that sentiment. Its estimated that 107 billion humans have been born since we evolved. Anyone who thinks their 'special bundle of joy' is more important then contributing to a business - especially ones the like of which Musk runs - is delusional. Think big. Under Musk, we go to Mars. Work the damn hours.

[Anonymous Coward]

Anthropology

"Its estimated that 107 billion humans have been born since we evolved. "

I don't know by whom, but I think there may be a decimal point in the wrong place. It's only recently that humans have become such a numerous species; between 1300 and 1400 the population of England roughly halved from 5 million to 2.5 million, and for the time England was a densely populated country.

But your sociopathic comment (because that's what it is) misses a significant point. Why is my child less important than Musk getting rich? This worship of the rich is a rather American phenomenon, but you ignore the fact that NASA has achieved many, many times more than Musk - with engineers who work 40 hour weeks because NASA knows that people who work long hours make mistakes. And NASA is a government venture that acquires knowledge which benefits the whole human race, not a group of shareholders.

I really wouldn't want to visit the Mars Division of Musk Industries Inc. in order to go to the Mars Macdonalds and stay in the Mars Hilton. But that's where his version of progress leads.

[druck]

CherylWillBounceBack wrote:

Anyone who thinks their 'special bundle of joy' is more important then contributing to a business - especially ones the like of which Musk runs - is delusional.

Spoken by someone with no children, and thankfully, never likely to have.

[CherylWillBounceBack]

20 down votes. Poe's law is proven again. The fact you all thought I was serious is even more frightening than my post.

[Anonymous Coward]

Poe's law is proven again.

Unfortunately there are plenty of people posting on the web who espouse exactly the views you put forward. Especially the "we've got to cut population dramatically and get off this rock" variety.

[JustNiz]

Expecting a worker that doesn't own any part of the company to personally care enough to work extra hours for free is ridiculous. The employer-employee relationship is a simple business contract between equals. Nothing less or more. Workers exchange hours/talent for money with the employer. When one side abuses that, its time to push back.

You wouldn't phone a plumber then once he's in the door demand he work for nothing, so why do employers think they can do it? The simple answer is entirely because the employees allow it to work. Employers like Musk understand human psychology enough to know that, and divisively use words like "We've gotten soft" and "commitment to the company" just as a way to (ab)use it and make more free money for himself.

Next time your employer tells you to work extra hours for free, try asking them to give you some extra money for nothing and see how sincere THEY really are about "showing commitment".

Sure employees often complain to each other about unpaid overtime expectations but in reality how often do they do something about it? stand together? never. Until you stand up for yourselves just accept you will be treated like the employers bitches you allow yourselves to be, and stop whining about it.

[John Mangan]

Spot on!

I enjoy my work (on the whole) but my 'job' is a compromise between the twin desires to live somewhere dry, warm and stocked with food and to have all of my time for me (even if I choose to spend that time doing no more than lying on a sofa watching reflected sunlight on the ceiling).

I don't expect to get paid for doing nothing and neither do I expect to work for nothing.

(That's not to say that I won't be flexible in the case of an emergency - but emergencies should not be happening every week or even every month).

[druck]

Tricks of the trade

JustNiz wrote:

You wouldn't phone a plumber then once he's in the door demand he work for nothing, so why do employers think they can do it?

More likely you'll be paying him for a good chunk of nothing. If a trades person they say they haven't got the replacement part on the van, and they have to nip to the shop to get one, pretty likely they'll actually be off to another job. You'll still being paying for their time until they get back though.

[sabroni]

Re: good point Druck!

Carry on Musk! Apparently most tradesmen are dodgy so you do what you like!

[Anonymous Coward]

So a Reg Author wrote a book that is full of exaggerations and probably all made up?? Yeh I can believe that.

[phuzz]

But the chapter titles are hilarious!

[Vogler]

Musk is perfect...

...a perfect capitalist. Exploit his workers up to the point before they break. And most workers are full of fear, fear of loosing their job. That's why such schemes work.

[The HLM]

Amaricans are certified lunies

So it seems normal to work in the weekends and off hours... If so you are absolutely crazy.

Even in China working conditions are better than that.

Commitment is certainly important, working on odd hours and weekends certainly NOT.

It only leads to bad products and lost productivity !

[Infernoz]

Bill Gate is a corporate vampire deserving no respect

I forget to mention that I see Bill Gates as a sack of excrement for expecting workers to work extra hours for him to more value a business and for his numerous other documented offensive ideas and actions. Corporatism is always wrong, and most corporate executive pay is plain insane and completely unjustified.

I don't care how much of their trust fund an obscenely rich executive donates, they should not have so much that they need to fake-guiltily buy 'popularity', and the funds can end up spent on things which turn out to be bad, which due diligence would have revealed, if they even care.