Elon Musk added to his work portfolio late final 12 months, when he acquired Twitter for $44 billion and appointed himself CEO. Whereas he not too long ago introduced a successor for that position, the job is at the moment nonetheless his, and he stays the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX.

He talked about attempting to handle his schedule in an interview on Tuesday on the The Wall Road Journal’s CEO Council Summit.

“My days are very lengthy and complex as you may think,” Musk stated. “And there is an excessive amount of context switching,” he stated, emphasizing that “switching context is is kind of painful.”

Musk stated he usually tries to divide his schedule “so it is predominantly one firm on someday.”

However that is not at all times attainable. This Tuesday was “a Tesla day,” he stated, however he “may find yourself at Twitter late tonight, after which tomorrow could be partly a Tesla day as properly, half Twitter after which Thursday could be form of a half-SpaceX, half-Tesla day.”

He described his jobs as “considerably intertwined,” and stated “the time administration is extraordinarily tough.”

The complexity hasn’t been good for his investments. Tesla shares misplaced greater than half their worth within the two months after the Twitter deal closed final 12 months, on concern that Musk would have much less time to concentrate on the electrical automotive maker even because the market was getting extra aggressive. In the meantime, advertisers fled or quickly suspended their campaigns on Twitter, and in March Musk marked down the worth of the corporate to $20 billion. Musk stated on Tuesday that many advertisers are coming again.

Whereas different executives might outsource their calendar to a chief of employees or government assistant, Musk stated he does most of his scheduling on his personal. He stated he has “one part-time assistant” to assist him handle his work schedule, a indisputable fact that was corroborated by a former Tesla worker.

“It is unimaginable for another person to know what the priorities are,” Musk stated, including that he’s normally working most hours of the day, wrapping up at 2 a.m., his typical bedtime.

At Twitter, Musk now plans to shift into the position of government chairman and know-how chief, with former NBC advert government Linda Yaccarino slated to change into CEO.

Nonetheless, Twitter is primarily a know-how firm, so his ongoing job as CTO will seemingly be demanding.

Thorold Barker, The Wall Road Journal’s editor for Europe, Center East and Africa, requested Musk if he has a succession plan in place at his companies.

“Succession is likely one of the hardest, age-old issues,” Musk stated. “It is plagued nations, kings, prime ministers and presidents, and CEOs because the daybreak of historical past.”

Musk stated he is informed his boards, “in all instances,” who’s his option to take over in a “worst-case state of affairs.” He emphasised the businesses’ boards may additionally go in one other course so far as who ought to step into his sneakers.

At Tesla, there’s been hypothesis that finance chief Zachary Kirkhorn is amongst candidates who Musk would endorse as a successor.

As CNBC beforehand reported, Musk’s corporations incessantly have interaction in associated occasion transactions, and he is confronted political strain to extra cleanly separate them.

After Musk took over Twitter, for instance, he approved dozens of workers from Tesla, SpaceX and the Boring Co. to assist him on the social media enterprise. The “transition group” he established at Twitter was concerned in every part from code evaluate to personnel and facilities-related selections.

Musk was additionally a co-founding director and donor to OpenAI, a former non-profit that is now backed by Microsoft. Monetary filings from 2017 for OpenAI reveal that Musk donated round $250,000 price of Tesla autos as a part of his thousands and thousands of {dollars} price of donations to OpenAI again in its earlier days.

Of late, Musk has been brazenly attacking OpenAI’s company construction and the quantity of possession it is bought to Microsoft. On Tuesday, Musk talked some about X.ai, a competitor he desires to develop in an effort to problem OpenAI, and Google’s DeepMind.

“I do not need to soar the gun right here on bulletins,” Musk stated. “However OpenAI has a relationship with Microsoft that appears to work pretty properly, and it is attainable that X.ai and Twitter and Tesla would have one thing related.”

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