When it comes to pausing the world for a comment, observation or joke, few people command the attention enjoyed by Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk. With more than 78 million people following him on Twitter (NYSE:TWTR), the world’s media reporting on his latest remarks and a mass following of investors and acolytes hanging on his every word, Musk is arguably the most influential wordsmith in the English-speaking world.
And for those who cannot get enough of what Musk has to say, here are 20 of his most pithy quotes designed to inspire and entertain.
On Risk Taking:
• "When Henry Ford made cheap, reliable cars, people said, 'Nah, what's wrong with a horse?' That was a huge bet he made, and it worked."
• "In the early days of aviation, there was a great deal of experimentation and a high death rate."
• "Failure is an option here. If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough."
• "There's a tremendous bias against taking risks. Everyone is trying to optimize their ass-covering."
• "When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favor."
On Building A Company:
• "The path to the CEO's office should not be through the CFO's office, and it should not be through the marketing department. It needs to be through engineering and design."
• "I don't believe in process. In fact, when I interview a potential employee and he or she says that 'it's all about the process,' I see that as a bad sign. The problem is that at a lot of big companies, process becomes a substitute for thinking. You're encouraged to behave like a little gear in a complex machine. Frankly, it allows you to keep people who aren't that smart, who aren't that creative."
• "It's OK to have your eggs in one basket, as long as you control what happens to that basket."
• "As much as possible, avoid hiring MBAs. MBA programs don't teach people how to create companies."
• "We have a strict 'no-assholes policy' at SpaceX."
On Innovation:
• "You shouldn't do things differently just because they're different. They need to be better."
• "The United States is definitely ahead in culture of innovation. If someone wants to accomplish great things, there is no better place than the U.S."
• "Government isn't that good at rapid advancement of technology. It tends to be better at funding basic research. To have things take off, you've got to have commercial companies do it."
• "I think most of the important stuff on the Internet has been built. There will be continued innovation, for sure, but the great problems of the Internet have essentially been solved."
• "Good ideas are always crazy until they are not."
On Being Elon Musk:
• "I could either watch it happen or be a part of it."
• "I say something, and then it usually happens. Maybe not on schedule, but it usually happens."
• "I wouldn't say I have a lack of fear. In fact, I'd like my fear emotion to be less because it's very distracting and fries my nervous system."
• "I've actually not read any books on time management."
• "I would like to die on Mars. Just not on impact."
Photo via NASA /Flickr Creative Commons
