Featured Image Credit: The Washington Post / Contributor / Getty
You don't get to be the world's richest man by sitting on your hands, and while there's been a recent backlash to Elon Musk's position as the head of the Department of Government Efficiency, you've got to admit he likes to keep himself busy.
As well as heading up the DOGE, Elon Musk is the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, owns X (formerly Twitter), and somehow found time to father 13 children (possibly 14). Alongside all of this, he's accused of being constantly online and told The Wall Street Journal in 2023 how he typically goes to bed at 03:00 am before getting up at 09:00 am.
With his seemingly packed schedule, Musk isn't a man who likes to have his time wasted, apparently repeatedly walking out of one type of meeting.
A 2018 email was sent to all Tesla employees and verified by CNBC, highlighting how he walks out of meetings that waste his time.
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The email included six tips to increase productivity, with Musk citing frequent meetings or ones that pad out their time with jargon as impacting Tesla's time. Correspondence from the Tesla boss explains: "Excessive meetings are the blight of big companies and almost always get worse over time. Please get [out] of all large meetings, unless you’re certain they are providing value to the whole audience, in which case keep them very short.”
He also advises to walk out of meetings where you don't think you're adding value. The tech billionaire added: "Walk out of a meeting or drop off a call as soon as it is obvious you aren’t adding value. It is not rude to leave, it is rude to make someone stay and waste their time."
Elsewhere, Musk says that information needs to travel quickly instead of through a chain of command, saying: "Any manager who attempts to enforce chain of command communication will soon find themselves working elsewhere."
The email was leaked amid Tesla halting production at its two main factories so it could upgrade equipment and increase output to up to 4,000 models a week. The call to action asked Tesla workers to try and streamline their working hours and help boost the output of the workforce and Tesla in general.
“Walk out of a meeting as soon as it is obvious you aren’t adding value. It’s not rude to leave, it is rude to make someone stay and waste their time.”
— Zach Holman (@holman) April 18, 2018
Tucked in a Tesla memo today, @elonmusk on running meetings: https://t.co/R5t1Qn0Z5W pic.twitter.com/0Pr4XzfS8D
In the same strongly worded email, Musk called out suppliers that weren't meeting Tesla's standards: "Some parts suppliers will be unwilling or unable to achieve this level of precision. I understand that this will be considered an unreasonable request by some.
“That’s ok, there are lots of other car companies with much lower standards. They just can’t work with Tesla."
With Musk only taking on more responsibilities since the 2018 email, we imagine he's walking out of more meetings than ever. Still, his ties to Tesla have become a point of contention.
Dealing with an outbreak of violence at dealerships and calls to boycott the EV brand, Musk is facing calls from one of Tesla’s top investors to fire him.
As Tesla is apparently going to feel the pinch of President Donald Trump's import tariffs while Musk sits at his right-hand side, his role at Tesla continues to be called into question.
