SpaceX is the day job: about 80% of his time. He was chairman and principal owner of Tesla, not running it daily, about two to three days a month.
"I spent 80 of my time on SpaceX"
How hard should founders work?
Q2042 answers2007-2026
Short answer
A maniacal sense of urgency from the leader, aggressive 50th-percentile deadlines, and attacking the limiting factor.
All 42 answers, oldest to newest
2007 ยท 1 answer
2012 ยท 2 answers
He does not ever give up; he would have to be dead or completely incapacitated. A fourth failure would have exhausted the company's resources.
"I don't ever give up I mean I'd have to be dead or completely incapacitated"
Actively seek out and listen carefully to negative feedback; people tend to avoid it because it is painful, and that is a common mistake.
"actively seek out um and listen very carefully to negative feedback"
2013 ยท 4 answers
A friend (Billy, in the caption) said starting a company is eating glass and staring into the abyss; the beginning is fun, then years of hell.
"starting a company is like eating glass and staring into the abyss"
He does not have a good answer; he works a lot. The useful framework is first-principles physics, plus soliciting negative feedback.
"I work a lot. I mean, a lot"
He said he is doing this because he thinks he has to, not because he wants to โ maybe an important consideration.
"I'm doing this because I think I have to, not because I want to"
Starting a company is staring into the abyss and eating glass: most startups fail, and the CEO works the problems they wish they were not working on.
"starting a company is like starting into the abyss and eating glass"
2014 ยท 4 answers
He said hours vary; these days about 80โ85 a week, and for a while over 100, with the pain of work hours increasing exponentially.
"probably eighty eighty five hours a week"
He framed a 90-hour week as 45 hours for SpaceX and 45 for Tesla, adding it is a bloodbath on a personal basis.
"a 90 hour week that's only 45 hours before SpaceX and Tesla"
He said that, particularly when starting a company, you need to work super hard.
"you need to work super hard"
He said if someone else works 50 hours and you work 100, you get twice as much done in a year.
"if somebody else is working 50 hours and you're working 100, you'll get twice as done as much done"
2015 ยท 1 answer
He said he is constitutionally geared to just keep going. The work is important to the future, and if they fail people will use it as a reason not to try.
"I think I'm kind of constitutionally just geared to just keep going"
2016 ยท 1 answer
About 80% of his time is engineering and design of next-generation product, not media or business.
"80% of it is spent on engineering design"
2017 ยท 1 answer
He said they max out R&D; he spends most of his time on engineering โ probably 80% of his week is engineering meetings โ and any revenue goes right back into R&D.
"that's probably 80% of my week is engineering meetings"
2018 ยท 3 answers
Most people don't realize he is in the factory, design or engineering meetings or production about 89% of the time; Twitter is almost nothing.
"that's like 89 of the time"
He said whenever you try to do something and avoid hard work, good things do not come from that.
"whenever you try to do something like and avoid hard work I mean, good things do not come from that"
Says nobody ever changed the world on 40 hours a week.
"There are way easier places to work, but nobody ever changed the world on 40 hours a week"
2019 ยท 1 answer
He said he wants to get the most amount done possible; he takes breaks only to get more done. He would not recommend running two companies. Asked when he last had a work-free week, he said the year 2000, when he had malaria.
"I would not recommend running two companies"
2021 ยท 9 answers
He says people who want to be him or do what he has done are probably mistaken.
"If somebody wants to be me or do things I've done, they should. I. I would say most probably you're mistaken. You do not want to do that."
He says he could not expect people to go all out if he was not doing the same.
"I was asking people to really go all out, you know, And I can't expect them to go all out if I'm not doing the same thing."
He says his days are generally back-to-back meetings.
"It's generally back to back meetings and it's insane."
He says context switching is a real bear, so he tries to focus on one thing at a time.
"Context switching is a real bear. So just basically try to do less context switching."
He recalls that his first company had only one computer and the website only worked during the day.
"when we started our first company, we only had one computer."
He says there have been long, very painful and difficult stretches in his life.
"There are pretty long sections in my life that have been very painful and difficult."
He says when the team is asked to work super hard, he has to be right there with them where they can see it.
"To really work super hard, I gotta be right there with them and they gotta see it."
He says his schedule is pretty intense and he has thought about taking a week off to clear his mind.
"I was thinking like, maybe I should like at some point, like take a week off or something"
He says he slept on the floor outside the conference room so people could see he was there.
"So I slept on the floor outside the conference room."
2023 ยท 3 answers
A 20-hour workday is relatively unusual and rather painful; he sleeps six hours a night. If he sleeps less he is awake longer but gets less done. He works pretty much seven days a week from waking to sleep.
"I do sleep six hours a night"
His advice: if you need encouragement to start a company, do not do it.
"My advice would be that if you need encouragement to start a company, don't do it."
He says the probability of failure is very high, so if you need encouragement, do not do it.
"If you need encouragement, don't do it."
2024 ยท 2 answers
He says Tesla takes most of his work time and he rarely takes a Sunday afternoon off.
"It's rare for me to take a Sunday afternoon off, so I make sure Tesla is quite prosperous."
He said bernie suffers from the โmagical horn of plentyโ fallacy. He thinks goods & services are generated automatically by magic. Since he is a taker, not a maker, he doesnโt realize that it takes hard work to make stuff. If...
"Bernie suffers from the โmagical horn of plentyโ fallacy. He thinks goods & services are generated automatically by magic. Since he is a taker, not a maker, he doesnโt realize that it takes hard work to make stuff. If you reduce hours worked from 40 to 32, there will be roughly 20% less stuff produced, so average living standards drop by 20%!"
2025 ยท 8 answers
He says America needs to make manufacturing cool again.
"we need to make manufacturing cool again in America."
He said DOGE is working 120 hour a week. Our bureaucratic opponents optimistically work 40 hours a week. That is why they are losing so fast.
"DOGE is working 120 hour a week. Our bureaucratic opponents optimistically work 40 hours a week. That is why they are losing so fast."
He sleeps about 6 hours on average and works almost every waking hour.
"I work almost every waking hour"
He said back to spending 24/7 at work and sleeping in conference/server/factory rooms. I must be super focused on ๐/xAI and Tesla (plus Starship launch next week), as we have critical technologies rolling out. As evidenced by...
"Back to spending 24/7 at work and sleeping in conference/server/factory rooms. I must be super focused on ๐/xAI and Tesla (plus Starship launch next week), as we have critical technologies rolling out. As evidenced by the ๐ uptime issues this week, major operational improvements need to be made. The failover redundancy should have worked, but did not."
He said it is important, albeit extremely hard work, to localize supply chains to mitigate geopolitical risk
"It is important, albeit extremely hard work, to localize supply chains to mitigate geopolitical risk"
He described a weekend of midnight Optimus engineering, Saturday AI5 chip reviews, a Colossus II datacenter walk, and back-to-back Tesla meetings focused on AI, Optimus production and vehicle delivery.
"Daddy is very much home. Am burning the midnight oil with Optimus engineering on Friday night, then redeye overnight to Austin arriving 5am, wake up to have lunch with my kids and then spend all Saturday afternoon in deep technical reviews for the Tesla AI5 chip design. Fly to Colossus II on Monday to walk the whole datacenter floor, review transformers and power production (excellent progress), depart midnight. Then up to 12 hours of back to back meetings across all Tesla departments, but particular focus on AI/Autopilot, Optimus production plans and vehicle production/delivery."
Making a startup succeed requires serious hours.
"you definitely need to put in serious hours"
Make more than you take; pursue useful products and expect to grind super hard.
"they should expect to grind super hard"
2026 ยท 2 answers
A maniacal sense of urgency from the leader, aggressive 50th-percentile deadlines, and attacking the limiting factor.
"a maniacal sense of urgency is a very big deal"
Asked what makes supposedly impossible industrial projects possible, he said just hard work.
"Just hard work"
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