Elon Musk Case Study

Elon Musk, a South African entrepreneur that founded PayPal, which was later bought by eBay for $1.5billion (CNET, 2009). He is currently the CEO of Tesla Motors and SpaceX, the companies he created using the profit he made from selling PayPal. Mr. Musk’s entrepreneurial attitude and persistence of transforming his ideas into products led him to his great success. Tesla Motors is an electric vehicle company that was founded with a goal of making the world a better place. With Mr. Musk being the chief product architect of Tesla Motors, he led his company with his unique car designs to be the first company in the industry that invented a fully electrical sports car (Teslamotors.com, 2014). Mr. Musk’s other company Space X was founded with a unique

Mr. Musk follows the transformational leadership style. The concept of transformational leadership was first introduced by leadership expert and presidential biographer James McGregor Burns. He explained that transformational leaders are charismatic leaders that aim to inspire their followers through their vision and personality. In addition, transformational leaders are able to influence and change their followers’ perceptions, expectations, and motivate them to work towards achieving the common goal of the organization. The transformational theory was further researched and updated by researcher Bernard M.Bass and Bruce Avolio. Bass and Avolio’s research results were the four components that are labeled “The Four I’s”. The Four I’s stand for (Huczynski and Buchanan,

Musk is a transformational leader. To begin with he has an idealized influence on his followers. Not only did he believe in his own vision even when everyone else doubted him, but he also risked his own financial security for his companies’ success. That influenced his followers’ to trust him, believe in him and his ideas and to also think of new, innovative ways of inventing things. Moreover, Mr. Musk is a transformational leader since he has the inspirational motivation attribute of transformational leaders. Most of his employees were drawn to his companies by his vision, persistence, and dedication. In addition, Mr. Musk doesn’t force his employees to work hard or work over-time, but he instead sets an example to them by doing it himself. He works for 100 hours a week, which lead all his employees to have a shared value that they are expected to work just as hard and efficiently. The third attribute of transformational leaders that I found in Mr. Musk’s personality is intellectual stimulation. Mr. Musk’s revolutionary companies revolutionized two of the most diverse and turbulent industries. Therefore, all of his employees are inspired by his willpower to always stay on top of the game by creating new products and improving the spaceships and the electrical cars industry. Furthermore Mr. Musk’s individualized consideration makes him a successful leaser. Mr. Musk believes that informing his employees of the company’s