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Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

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Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#121

Post by cptcobalt »

Yes. Speaking from experience:

1. You're typically working on small teams with some wickedly smart people around you. Very, very few dummies or under performers at his companies. Definitely a community feel where you know everyone in the spheres around you. Also, everyone wants to help you, and so you tend to respond in the same way back to others.

2. You get to question everything, and the first answer is often not the right answer but you have to actually use your brain to get to the right answer. No inactive listening, even when you're getting feedback or asks from execs.

3. You know what the North Star is, and you're laser focused on it. If what you're working on doesn't build toward that mission, you're encouraged to speak up and question it, no matter where you are in the company. There are generally no rules for who you can and can't talk to.

4. He pays the most attention when things aren't going so well. If you and your team keep a tight ship, keep up with the (fun) timelines, communicate out well, and grow and learn appropriately, things will tend to go smoothly. Not always true, but it tends to be.

--

The Twitter situation totally sucks, and I empathize with everyone impacted, but I think Elon is working to bring the style that is proven to work for SpaceX and Tesla over to Twitter. There are definitely growing pains to switch to this model.

If you believe in the stated missions of each company, and think your work will do a net good for yourself and others, then it's a no brainer to want to work there.

Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#122

Post by TheCoelacanth »

wellthatsawrap1 wrote: post #113
pavlov wrote: post #40

I’m not interested in working for anyone who thinks it’s a great idea to send out a mandatory web link where you either sign a statement saying “I pledge to work hardcore and tirelessly for the singular product vision of our mighty leader” or you’re immediately fired. This happened last night: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/11/16/musk-tw... At this point he’s just actively looking to surround himself…

No, he's looking to get rid of all the bloat at Twitter and retain the engineers that want to work on engineering problems and not play at politics and activism. Good riddance.

Sure, nothing says getting rid of politics like swearing personal loyalty oaths and firing anyone whose opinion contradicts the CEO.

Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#123

Post by stephc_int13 »

whiddershins wrote: post #58
stephc_int13 wrote: post #18

His management style is not the worst thing about the guy. If all the legends about him were true (superhuman BS detector, genius level IQ, laser sharp focus) I'd be happy to be part of the team. Unfortunately, I think his main talent is the uncanny ability to overhype himself. He is lucky that a side effect of this ability helped him hire and motivate really good engineers. Thay might not be sufficient in the long r…

Rocket stages that land and are reused is the opposite of vaporware.

Agreed, and this is good.

Elon legend is not 100% BS like SBF.

But what about all the undelivered promises?

Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#124

Post by aczerepinski »

eric4smith wrote: post #50

Yes. A big part of being a business owner is that you fall on the spectrum of being an asshole. A little bit or a lot. It takes being an asshole to do large things. And people end up hating you for it. The bigger things you do, the bigger of an asshole you end up being. Quick, name me the leader of a large company who is not an asshole… And if they are not publicly one, privately they are. The traits of a leader requ…

Warren Buffett.

Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#125

Post by wordyskeleton »

bheadmaster wrote: post #102
mcphage wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Elon puts a lot of focus on ability and skill over formalities and organizations I'm curious what this means to you, because when I see people from inside Twitter correct him on Twitter, with specific technical statements describing what's going on—and then he fires them—that seems like formalities way outranking ability and skill.

> I'm curious what this means to you In short, it means that doing things better (e.g. making a piece of software faster) for the sake of things being done better is praised, not tolerated, as is the case in the many "let's just ship it, we'll fix it later" software companies. > when I see people from inside Twitter correct him on Twitter, with specific technical statements describing what's going on—and then he fire…

How can you characterize Twitter's current modus operandi under Musk as anything but "let's just ship it, we'll fix it later"? They're on iteration 5 or 6 of the checkmarks within the last week.

Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#126

Post by mattbrewsbytes »

biddit wrote: post #83

To me this question would only be asked from someone who is part of the Silicon Vally/FAANG/woke bubbles. There are many engineers who are not part of the those bubbles who would be interested in working for him. I know a half dozen personally, and I would too. You state that he is gaslighting as if it is a fact. I'm no Elon Stan. What I see is someone walking into an incredibly disorganized organization and creating…

Elon's worldview of how an organization should be structured and run is vastly different than what I can glean about twitters culture. Could either of these types of cultures succeed? Probably. There isn't a definitive "one way" to succeed as an organization.

I think it remains to be seen if his other companies can be successful in the long term. Some may claim Tesla is but they haven't had to go through a car re-design yet [0] or face any serious competition. Once they navigate those for a few years it will be easier to understand if they are successful long term.

[0] tangent: all major car companies have to re-design their products every few years because in the US cars are status/part of identity and people get tired of seeing old designs and want new shiny things. Its irrational but it happens. There are compelling new designs of EV from other manufacturers, how Tesla responds once people are tired of the singular Tesla design and have other EV choices will be interesting.

Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#127

Post by [deleted] »

stephc_int13 wrote: post #111
FredPret wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t get what people mean by this. I have mixed feelings about the guy, but vaporware? Are the rockets not real? Are the cars and solar panels and tunnels and Paypal not real? Of course he didn’t single-handedly do this. Of course other engineers were invaluable in the process. But he forced Tesla and SpaceX into existence when everyone thought it was guaranteed to fail. We saw people trying with electric cars and…

The rockets and the cars are real. -Tunnels are BS -Hyperloop is dumb BS -TeslaBot demos are embarassingly bad -Neuralink seems to be BS -Solar Tiles are BS -The PowerWall is semi-legit but overpriced -The roadster/semi/cybertruck are suspiciously late -A lot of the Mars plans are weak/delusional

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#128

Post by mikkergp »

bheadmaster wrote: post #19

Considering that Elon puts a lot of focus on ability and skill over formalities and organizations, and that he believes that small team of highly-skilled highly-motivated people can often (always?) out-perform large teams of moderately-skilled moderately-motivated people, I'd say yes. I find a lot of joy in working on challenging problems without having to deal with bureaucracy bullshit. I have a feeling that Elon li…

I think I would love to work in an environment like you describe, but my one experience in an environment like this before was that people really emphasize working hard over working smart. (Also, if I'm not allowed to push back against management, that would be a deal breaker) I wonder what they do to stop and think of new approaches to work when everyone is tired all the time working 12 hours days. Often I find I can save 10's or hundreds of hours just from taking a break and thinking about the problem differently. Maybe I should interview to see what it's like out of the horses mouth and not rumors on the web, but my impression of the culture he is proposing is long hours for the vision, not because the work itself is engaging.

Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#129

Post by lostmsu »

rtpg wrote: post #43
stephc_int13 wrote: post #18

His management style is not the worst thing about the guy. If all the legends about him were true (superhuman BS detector, genius level IQ, laser sharp focus) I'd be happy to be part of the team. Unfortunately, I think his main talent is the uncanny ability to overhype himself. He is lucky that a side effect of this ability helped him hire and motivate really good engineers. Thay might not be sufficient in the long r…

One thing that can be said about Twitter, is it is really revealing of how people are, rather than how their PR teams try to view people. Maybe he’s playing 4D chess, but I don’t know if there’s a lot of superhuman chess behind signing a binding agreement waiving due diligence at a meme price. The man is a walking unforced error. Given the downturn of access to free money I wonder what happens next for him (and other…

> One thing that can be said about Twitter, is it is really revealing of how people are, rather than how their PR teams try to view people.

This is extremely naive. Most people likely use their inner "PR team" when posting.

Re: Ask HN: Would You Work for Elon?

#130

Post by jakelazaroff »

wellthatsawrap1 wrote: post #113
pavlov wrote: post #40

I’m not interested in working for anyone who thinks it’s a great idea to send out a mandatory web link where you either sign a statement saying “I pledge to work hardcore and tirelessly for the singular product vision of our mighty leader” or you’re immediately fired. This happened last night: https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/11/16/musk-tw... At this point he’s just actively looking to surround himself…

No, he's looking to get rid of all the bloat at Twitter and retain the engineers that want to work on engineering problems and not play at politics and activism. Good riddance.

I mean, Elon’s single biggest push at Twitter so far — ending the “lords and peasants system” by allowing anyone to get a blue check — is “politics and activism”.
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