The Elon Musk Method

Most businesses fail not because they aim too high, but because they waste time perfecting the wrong things. Elon Musk’s 5-step formula for building successful companies flips this on its head. It’s about focusing on what truly matters, cutting the fat, and then refining the rest. The order of these steps is crucial—get them wrong, and you’ll just make the wrong things happen faster.

Here’s Musk’s method, broken down:

1. Make Your Requirements Less Dumb

Before you start building anything, challenge everything. Musk’s point is: your requirements are probably “dumb.” It sounds harsh, but it’s true. If you can’t justify why something needs to exist, then it doesn’t. The goal is to make things as simple as possible.

Example: When Henry Ford created the Model T, he didn’t just build a car. He redefined the idea of personal transportation by questioning why cars needed to be expensive and complicated. By simplifying the design, he made the car accessible to millions—something that had never been done before.

2. Delete Any Part or Process You Can

Here’s where the magic happens: if it’s not essential, get rid of it. The tendency is to overcomplicate things, believing that more features or steps equal better quality. But often, less is more. Musk believes that deleting unnecessary parts solves more problems than optimization ever will.

Example: Steve Jobs was relentless about simplicity at Apple. When creating the first iPhone, he eliminated everything that wasn’t absolutely necessary—physical buttons, extra software, anything that didn’t improve the user experience. This approach redefined what a phone could be and changed the tech industry completely.

3. Simplify or Optimize the Design

Once you’ve stripped away the fluff, the next step is to make what’s left work flawlessly. The key here is to focus on optimizing a system that actually works. Trying to optimize a flawed design will only make things worse.

Example: Jeff Bezos simplified Amazon’s early business model by focusing on what mattered most: customer experience. He streamlined the process of buying books online—no complicated systems, just a fast and easy way for customers to get what they wanted. This focus on simplicity and efficiency made Amazon the e-commerce giant it is today.

4. Accelerate Cycle Time

Speed matters. The faster you can move from one cycle to the next, the faster you learn, improve, and adapt. Musk’s philosophy is that the quicker you go, the sooner you’ll figure out what works and what doesn’t.

Example: SpaceX’s development of reusable rockets exemplifies this. Instead of waiting years between launches, the company reduced the turnaround time by iterating quickly and learning from each launch. This rapid pace helped SpaceX achieve what was once thought impossible: making space travel more affordable and sustainable.

5. Automate

Finally, after you’ve simplified, optimized, and accelerated, automation can kick in. But not before. Too many entrepreneurs jump to automating a flawed process, thinking it will save time. In reality, it often just speeds up inefficiency. Musk’s approach is to only automate once the system is solid.

Example: Tesla’s Gigafactories use automation to scale production—but that wasn’t the first step. First, Musk focused on refining the design and the process. Only once the system was working smoothly did automation come in to ramp up production without compromising quality.

Why the Sequence Matters

Musk’s approach works because it forces you to get the fundamentals right before scaling. Too many entrepreneurs jump into automation or optimization too early, wasting time on systems that haven’t been proven to work. Musk’s order ensures that each step builds on the last, creating a structure that’s both efficient and sustainable.

Now, think about your own projects. Are you starting with automation or optimization before questioning the basics? What unnecessary processes or steps could you delete today? The hardest part is stepping back and challenging assumptions—but that’s where true breakthroughs happen.

If this sequence worked for Musk, Ford, Jobs, and Bezos, why not you? The next time you’re stuck, follow these steps. Start simple. Start right. And watch how everything else falls into place.

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