For this assignment, I read Elon Musk: Tesla, SpaceX, and the Quest for a Fantastic Future, Ashlee Vance
1) 
  • What surprised you the most? What surprised me the most is how in depth they looked into the mind of Elon Musk. What surprised me is that he is considered slightly manic and not always completely put together like you would think such a successful person would be. I was also surprised at how openly he discussed dealing with stress and how he seems to not let it affect him too much. 
  • What about the entrepreneur did you most admire? I admire the way Elon Musk has such a strong passion to limit the amount of oil we use on Earth and how conscious he is of making our technology more sustainable to reduce environmental impact. He seems to be so determined and motivated to succeed in the things he wants and has never shown any signs of his motivation slipping. He incorporated old-school Silicon Valley and combined it with the modern Apple-like design in order to create something that would be both sustainable and appealing. 
  • What about the entrepreneur did you least admire? I don't like how Elon Musk seems to be arrogant. His passion and drive can come across as egotistical and he makes a lot of big promises that he might not always keep. His ideas seem to be a little too far fetched, and it makes me question his sanity a bit. He feels such a strong need to accomplish anything he thinks of that I don't know if he stops himself to consider if it is a good idea or not. He is too impulsive, but the impulsivity has attributed to his huge success. 
  • Did the entrepreneur encounter adversity and failure? If so, what did they do about it? Elon Musk did encounter somewhat of a failure. He sold PayPal, and used the liquidity to start SpaceX. The startup forced him to go broke, and when he sold everything he had to live on couches. He scraped by until he was able to get a government contract and start Tesla. 
2) What competencies did you notice that the entrepreneur exhibited? The skills Musk is most competent in is his ability to keep moving forward. After losing all his money, he was able to push through and create one of the biggest companies in the world. He is really good at not letting his downfalls get the best of him, which keeps him moving forward.
3) Identify at least one part of the reading that was confusing to you. One part of the reading that was confusing for me was his talk about SpaceX. I don't really understand why he went into that business and was confused when they discussed it in the book. It seemed like a huge dream idea he made up in his head and decided to try it in real life. I was also confused about the interviewing process of the book and how they seemed to incorporate both interviews with non-fiction content. 
4) If you were able to ask two questions to the entrepreneur, what would you ask? Why? I would ask Elon Musk how he stays confident and motivated and I would also ask him what he does in his free time when he's not focused on business. 
5) For fun: what do you think the entrepreneur's opinion was of hard work? Do you share that opinion? Elon Musk would probably consider hard work both extremely important but also I feel that he likes to get things done as easily as possible. He works extremely hard himself, but he tends to accomplish things very quickly. If this is his opinion, I would share the same exact opinion.