The deeper you dive, the higher you fly: What do you have in common with Elon Musk? Elon Musk has time and again proven that magic is real. For anyone who wishes to see a mere mortal do the impossible I suggest you watch the February 2018 launch of the Falcon Heavy Rocket. If you’re in need of inspiration, you need look no further. And I have to admit that Wona and Lion Technologies 2.0 may not have existed had it not been for this historic feat.

Elon Musk has always understood that the best way to gain credibility is by giving credit. Whilst no one ever achieves anything alone, there is definitely something special about certain people where they inspire, and push those around them to achieve beyond their own individual ability, expectations and ambitions.

I’ve always known that madness and genius go hand in hand. For those beautiful minds that have the ability to revolutionise, inspire, teach others and push beyond their own limits they also have the ability to fall into a very dark place.

Farnsworth drank, Tesla gambled – the real people that shaped our society definitely had their own demons. But they all had one other thing in common. Mentally, they could dive deeper than anyone else around them and in many cases it pushed them to their limits, either physically, mentally, or both.

Born in 1971, Musk attributes much of his success to having a tough up-bringing and to always being socially conscious of the world around him and understanding how to make his perception of the world around him into reality.

But what are the character traits that have allowed our modern day real life Iron Man to pursue such big goals that has driven him to such great success in a relatively short space of time?

1. Be unpopular, be wrong

The modern day Iron Man is willing to take a contrarian stance. But not just for the sake of it. We have all at some point been sucked into the world of reality TV where some stubborn contestant allows their ego to get in their way instead of just admitting they are wrong. No one wants to appear wrong, especially not publicly but for Musk, he doesn’t care, and this willingness to be wrong allows you to fight for what you believe is the best decision for the greater good. A lot of the time this will result in him being unpopular with his colleagues, or at threat of trying to steal the spotlight from what was a team accomplishment. At times, leaders like Musk have to be unpopular and they have to make unpopular decisions whilst all the while knowing that for all his genius calculations, he can still be wrong.

2. Progress is impossible without change, and those that can not change their minds can not change anything – George Bernard Shaw

Be passionate, be a leader, especially in defeat. Musk has been nothing short of attacked by the press for every failure that he has incurred. It’s important to learn from your defeats, just like Space X has after several failed attempts to launch a rocket into space and return it safely to earth. Most people you work with will not be, as Steve Jobs described, ‘A’ Players.

Every time Space X and Tesla has had a monumental step back Musk has been able to take control swiftly and change his position to reassure his team, sometimes trading ‘A’ Players.

He has been able to challenge them and remind them that their competitors with their giant budgets and greater resources have sustained similar challenges and that they are nimble and will rapidly change for the better. This leadership style inspires. He understands that brains beats money, and passion beats brains alone. But brains and passion will build your colony on Mars. Adapt. Change. Grow. Adapt. Change. Grow.

3. If you’re the smartest person in the room, you’re probably in the wrong room

One of my old bosses, a tough, blonde Californian woman standing maybe 5”3 inches tall use to tell me ‘never stop recruiting’. And she was right – Musk understands this – it is rumoured that Musk use to interview every single person that worked at Space X in the early days because he understood the culture that he wanted to build and what was required in order to create brilliant reusable, cost effective spaceships. Recruitment is key. And if you are not constantly recruiting people that are better than you, or smarter than you in one specific key area of your business then your business will not reach its potential.

I’ve always believed that a person’s ego needs to remain firmly in their head, and this is key when hiring and building a team. One common character trait that the Musks, Thomas Edisons and Howard Hughes of this world all had in common was that they understood their limitations with time (and then ignored them). If you want to be successful you have to know that you can not do it all. Musk is able to calculate to the second how long a task should take – and then hire the right person to complete that task. Unlike many entrepreneurs Musk likes to set realistic but tough time frames and he needs people as smart, if not smarter than him in order to achieve these goals.

4. Most people fail in business because they are not tough enough. Be willing to bet the company!

Hollywood has done us all no favours in glamorising being a business person. Irrespective of the story told, most films only last two hours. A business is for life, every second of every day. Musk has been described as having a ridiculously high pain threshold and whilst working for the wrong person can hurt mentally, running the right company can hurt physically. Despite my distain for the word Entrepreneur, being an entrepreneur is lonely and no book or film will ever prepare you for the highs and lows of just how lonely it can be.

No one knows this better than Elon Musk, but he is able to endure extreme pain without losing focus. According to colleagues, he is able to continue to make logical decisions, in fact the more stressful the situation the more logical he tends to become. This has paid dividends quite literally, during the hardest of times. I have no doubt that writers in Hollywood are likely pitching scripts about some crazy entrepreneur as I type this, and for all the emotional music and profound script writing and story telling there is one characteristic you need to be successful and that is this Musk like willingness to endure pain and just keep taking it even when you have made the decision to bet the company on a new venture that will probably fail, but for some reason you still naively believe in it.

5. The most important sentence in the English language is……..’not a nice one’

You only need to Google Musk to find a plethora of articles in the press focusing on his set backs, failures, break downs and basically what a tyrant he can be. Personally, I think the Musks of this world are definitely more prone to madness, the deeper you dive inside your mind the scarier it can get and no one appears to be diving as deep as Elon right now. Elon Musk is possibly one of the smartest people on the planet and he has decided to dedicate his life to ‘trying’ to ensure the survival of the human race and has not focused on how many ‘likes’ his product can generate. He has more doubters than anyone else out there. He understands the huge undertaking of his task and we have all had people in our life, colleagues, friends, family that all doubt us – sadly it’s the people closest to us that tend to doubt us the most. Musk has to be mentally strong and willing to make allowance for people doubting him and quite literally ignore them.

6. Focus. Focus. Focus

Musk may be a genius, but if he divides his time between getting high and playing video games constantly he will not be successful. If you feel that you have to sacrifice certain things in life then you’re not made for business anyway. The Elon Musks, Bill Gates and Jack Ma’s off this world didn’t see it as a sacrifice. They were on a mission and were able to deeply focus with tunnel like precision and block out any unnecessary noise whilst epitomising David versus Goliath stubbornness in the way that Musk has. There is an arrogance there that knows that the ability to focus is more invaluable than all the resources at NASA combined.