As Elon Musk is now CEO of Tesla, SpaceX, Twitter, The Boring Company and Neuralink I'm wondering: Do CEO's generally not have so much to do that they can run so many companies at the same time or is Musk an exceptional talent?
Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
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Re: Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
#2Given how things are going at Twitter so far, one might rule out the second option. And there's probably investors who are asking themselves this question too.
Re: Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
#3There are plenty of conglomerates who are central companies who own a bunch of functionally distinct companies. Generally, each of these distinct companies have their own CEO and these CEOs will repo into the conglomerate's management structure.
I am sure in the case of Elon, there are de facto CEOs (and other leaders) at each of his orgs who effectively do the day to day management and report into Elon.
Re: Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
#4If you've got the right people in place, CEO could be a mostly ceremonial position.
I think though Musk seems overextended. The last two firms don't seem terribly important or difficult, but it would really be sad to see Starship fail because of problems at Twitter. If Tesla goes down, the electric car revolution is underway, but if SpaceX goes down Northrup Grumman and Boeing will have no difficulty building rockets to nowhere for a long, long, long, long time.
Re: Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
#5Mostly:
- Employ direct reports who are very competent
- Pay them well
- Give them a steer (usually "feed me / make more money)
- Repeat
Re: Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
#6He seems very distracted even without owning companies. He tweets as much as DJT used to in peak form, at all hours as well. I don't think he's often very focused to begin with so his companies can clearly cope.
It doesn't really matter how distracted he is though Tesla investors would be crazy to want him out, he is the reason for Tesla's valuation being so much larger than the rest of the automobile industry combined. Without him there would be a lot less reason for people to believe in it, another CEO would probably be much more sober minded and unable retain investor faith by just escalating rosy predictions and announcements of future successes after each setback
Re: Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
#7-Tesla doesn't need his input all that much at the moment. The key strategy is set, now they just need to execute operationally.
-Twitter is what he is doing now actively.
-I'm not sure he is doing anything in the Boring Company.
-Neuralink is like an R&D outfit, what does he even need to do there beyond hiring engineers?
-No idea about SpaceX.
Also, he can be the CEO of 5 companies because only one of them is public. If you think it is too much, you can show up to the TSLA shareholder meeting and vote him out, especially since he did not protect himself with dual class shares.
Re: Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
#8No post body was provided.
Re: Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
#9I feel a light touch is best. CEOs that run just one company are always changing this and that. They should get out of the way more and let their employees do their work.
Re: Ask HN: How is it possible to be the CEO of 5 companies at the same time?
#10There are plenty of conglomerates who are central companies who own a bunch of functionally distinct companies. Generally, each of these distinct companies have their own CEO and these CEOs will repo into the conglomerate's management structure. I am sure in the case of Elon, there are de facto CEOs (and other leaders) at each of his orgs who effectively do the day to day management and report into Elon.
This is the reality - conglomerates like Reliance Industries exist and have very wildly divergent business units.