Musk is such a frustrating person because he says important things like this and he should have the credibility to make it meaningful, but he's shot his mouth off so many times that half the world will say "lol, whatever Elon". Like remember when he called the diver in the Thai cave rescue a pedophile?
Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
121–130 of 259 posts
Re: Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
#122He is onto something there. Bean counting is useful and companies cannot survive without good cashflow, but it should not become Mission A of the company, or engineering (and other) talent will look elsewhere. If one company's de facto mission statement is "We want to grow our market by 8.2 per cent and give our bosses higher Christmas bonuses" and another one comes and says "Guys, we want to fly to fscking Mars!", c…
>"We want to grow our market by 8.2 per cent and give our bosses higher Christmas bonuses" This isn't a bad thing. Profit and price are, in most cases, still reasonable signals for what consumers want, and growing your market means you're serving real demand in the actual world. This is what creates employment and utility. Flying to Mars and ignoring market share is nice but doesn't serve any actual point, other than…
Right. But the company needs to have a point. Growing market share doesn't mean you're serving your customers' needs. You can grow your market share quite well by acting anti-competitively, or by exploiting your customers' weaknesses (gambling). No thanks.
Re: Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
#123It’s a matter of phase of company. MBAs are better at measuring and capturing value. Weaker at creating it. Therefore the non-MBA expert outperforms in the growth phase, though it takes a different mindset for mature companies.
There must exist a sweet spot of engineers/MBAs ratio. The question is: is company X higher or lower than that sweet spot?
It’s timing related. You need fewer in growth phases, though they’re good running sales ops. Need more with mature companies that are optimizing.
Re: Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
#124Somebody had to tell them. What a bunch of cry babies. These bean counters are ruinous to companies. And no, I don’t buy this simple narrative that MBAs are good for mature companies. Not at all. Look at companies like Boeing, ULA, Intel and others. Ruined by MBA guys. Why is AMD outperforming Intel today? Because they didn’t make an MBA person their CEO.
You need somebody in charge who understands the technology, product and customers well. Getting an outsider who only know how to look at spreadsheets and go to fancy dinners isn’t a receipt for success.
Re: Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
#125Re: Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
#126He is onto something there. Bean counting is useful and companies cannot survive without good cashflow, but it should not become Mission A of the company, or engineering (and other) talent will look elsewhere. If one company's de facto mission statement is "We want to grow our market by 8.2 per cent and give our bosses higher Christmas bonuses" and another one comes and says "Guys, we want to fly to fscking Mars!", c…
> but it should not become Mission A of the company, or engineering (and other) talent will look elsewhere. There's 3 things that I judge an employer by 1) Sector the company is in (Space, electric cars - Yay) 2) Revenue/Growth of the company (pie grows, does your share?) 3) Company culture (that's catch-all, but if you want a negative see that "don't hire the hot girl" guy) A lot of ways I care more about the sector…
Probably not for number 2, but that's speculation and not a data-driven statement.
I hypothesize that the _MBA type_ of bean counters optimize for their pie, not for the greater good or longer term growth.
Re: Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
#127He is onto something there. Bean counting is useful and companies cannot survive without good cashflow, but it should not become Mission A of the company, or engineering (and other) talent will look elsewhere. If one company's de facto mission statement is "We want to grow our market by 8.2 per cent and give our bosses higher Christmas bonuses" and another one comes and says "Guys, we want to fly to fscking Mars!", c…
That reminds me of my time at IBM under Palmisano a decade ago.
His goal was to increase the share price by x%. It was no secret one of the strategies was to cut jobs in high cost regions (US) and hire in low cost regions. You'd actually hear this in all hands meetings. It was shockingly shameless.
Re: Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
Our society has plenty of Elon Musks. Their being snuffed out by a academic system designed to churn out people can repeat "the correct answer". Heterodox thinking is a liability not an asset in Academia now. Along with the fact that most people don't even have the option to take risk with the massive increase of cost of housing. Our society has been designed to squeeze out cash flow and it's smothering our creatives…
Academia isn’t snuffing anything out. 1) American school education, and college education is amazing. ( if you can afford it). Talk to immigrant parents From other countries for a contra point. Crushing the soul of students isn’t fully installed in America, yet (which brings us to point 2) 2) It’s the economy. At some point, the American economy stopped working as well for blue collar roles as paths to middle class i…
>the American liberal arts system
Related to your second and third points, I think there is at least some case that the U.S. has moved away from the idea of liberal arts schooling towards being more vocationally minded. The intent, going back as far as the mid-1800s with the Morrill Act, was specifically intended to help serve a new growing economy.
If you ask, I bet more people look at college as a way to get a job than to learn to appreciate and contribute to culture
Re: Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
#129> “I think there might be too many M.B.A.s running companies,” the Tesla Inc. chief executive said. “There should be more focus on the product or service itself, less time on board meetings, less time on financials.” > Many business-school leaders shot back, saying that Mr. Musk’s comments don’t match the reality of what is taught in M.B.A. programs and that more students than ever who are pursuing the graduate degre…
It's less than tone deaf, it's plain ignorant. As much as I find Musk's unabashed ego distasteful, he has actually built companies and hired thousands of people. Musk is a doer - and you know the old saying about "those who can't do, teach." So if we're appealing to authority, I'll take Musk's over "business-school leaders."
Side note: I've rarely met a top b-school grad who could say they valued much taught during their MBA (aside from statistics). The consensus is usually that it's a great networking opportunity.
Re: Elon Musk Decries ‘M.B.A.-ization’ of America
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm stubborn too. I find my traits are still working against me. Neither bosses nor professors like their mistakes being called out. And it seems being well networked or making a good impression is more important than actual work or results (you're better off with the abilities to build junk and sell junk, than with the abilities to build good stuff and sell nothing)
Oh yeah stubbornness isn’t one of the traits I meant as good. I only meant that stubbornness is all that allowed me to keep certain good traits from being stamped out. It can just as easily (and in my case also sometimes has) prevented some bad traits from being stamped out. So I need to consciously go way overboard with “I could just as well be wrong” to balance out my natural stubbornness.
I wasn't talking about my stubbornness being a good trait. It's hurt more than helped, of that I'm sure.
The traits that hurt me in school still hurt me today. Like not being afraid to voice a minority opinion. Or correcting the boss/professor. Or having a strong adherence to the rules/policies and holding people/institutions to their word. Thinking outside the box or being more independent.