第二部分：极限硬核工作
English: To those who quietly help advance the causes we mutually believe in, knowing advancing the cause is the only reward: thank you.
中文： 致那些默默帮助我们共同信念的事业前进的人，知道推进事业是唯一的回报：谢谢你们。
WHAT IT TAKES
成功所需的条件
English: If conventional thinking makes your mission impossible, then unconventional thinking is necessary.
中文： 如果传统思维让你的任务变得不可能，那么非常规思维就是必要的。
Take Responsibility
承担责任
English: I am CEO of these companies because I feel I'm responsible for them, not because it's the best thing for my quality of life.
中文： 我是这些公司的 CEO，因为我觉得我对它们负有责任，不是因为这对我的生活质量是最好的。
English: I want to emphasize that sometimes—in fact, most of the time—I get way too much credit or attention for what I do. I'm just the visible element. The reason these companies are successful is because we have extremely talented people at all levels making it happen.
中文： 我想强调的是，有时——事实上，大多数时候——我因我所做的事情获得了太多的赞誉或关注。我只是可见的元素。这些公司成功的原因是因为我们在各个层面都有极其有才华的人让它实现。
English: I didn't expect to be CEO of these big companies. It just sort of happened that way. It was never my intent to run Tesla. Running two companies is quite a burden. Sometimes when people think of being a CEO, they imagine granting themselves lots of vacation and doing fun things. It doesn't work that way. What you actually get as CEO is a distillation of the worst things going on in the company.
中文： 我没想过会成为这些大公司的 CEO。只是碰巧变成了那样。我从未打算经营特斯拉。经营两家公司是相当大的负担。有时当人们想到成为 CEO 时，他们想象给自己很多假期和做有趣的事情。不是那样的。作为 CEO 你实际得到的是公司发生的最糟糕事情的浓缩。
English: Particularly, if you're the CEO, you work on all the worst problems in the company. There's no point in spending time on things that are going right, so you only spend time on things that are going wrong. Specifically, the things other people can't fix. The most pernicious and painful problems.
中文： 特别是，如果你是 CEO，你处理公司所有最糟糕的问题。花时间在做对的事情上没有意义，所以你只花时间在出错的事情上。具体来说，是其他人无法解决的问题。最有害和最痛苦的问题。
English: Q: How do you manage through failure?
中文： 问：你如何度过失败？
English: Managing through big failures is painful and difficult. It feels terrible. The company looks at me to rally them, so I do. But I feel terrible. Failure is a punch in the gut. Even when you've got a lot of smart people working super hard to minimize the probability of failure, it's still there. And it's quite significant.
中文： 度过重大失败是痛苦和困难的。感觉很糟糕。公司指望我来鼓舞他们，所以我这样做。但我感觉很糟糕。失败是对肠胃的一拳。即使你有很多聪明人超级努力地工作以最小化失败的概率，它仍然存在。而且相当显著。
English: Given the options, I prefer to learn from success.
中文： 在有选择的情况下，我更喜欢从成功中学习。
Earn Deep Understanding
获得深入理解
English: I wanted to know how the universe works and how the economy works. So, I studied physics and economics. You need to be able to bring a lot of people together to create something. It's difficult to do something as just an individual, especially for a significant technology.
中文： 我想知道宇宙如何运作以及经济如何运作。所以，我学习了物理学和经济学。你需要能够把很多人聚集在一起来创造一些东西。作为个人很难做一些事情，特别是对于重大技术。
English: I was concerned if I didn't study business I would be forced to work for someone who did, because they would know special things I didn't know. I didn't like the sound of that, so I made sure I knew those things, too.
中文： 我担心如果我不学习商业，我就会被强迫为学习过商业的人工作，因为他们会知道一些我不知道的特殊事情。我不喜欢那样，所以我确保我也知道那些事情。
English: Physics gave me the basics, a good analytical framework. Physics was rigorous, and we learned a lot of math. Later, I was in an advanced securities analysis class in the business school, and they were teaching people matrix math. I realized if you can do physics math, then business math is super easy.
中文： 物理学给了我基础知识，一个很好的分析框架。物理学很严谨，我们学了很多数学。后来，我在商学院上了一门高级证券分析课，他们在教人们矩阵数学。我意识到如果你能做物理学数学，那么商业数学就超级简单。
English: My goals were to engineer products by having a feel for the physics and to never work for a boss with a business degree.
中文： 我的目标是通过对物理学的感觉来设计产品，并且永远不为拥有商业学位的老板工作。
English: One reason SpaceX could move so quickly is I made both the engineering decisions and the spending decisions together in one brain. In most companies, those decisions require at least two different people.
中文： SpaceX 能够如此快速行动的一个原因是我在一个大脑中同时做出工程决策和支出决策。在大多数公司，这些决策需要至少两个不同的人。
English: There's some engineering guy who's trying to convince a finance guy that this money should be spent. But the finance guy doesn't understand engineering, so he can't tell if this is a good way to spend money or not. Plus, they may not trust each other. I'm making the engineering and spending decisions together with all the information in one place. My brain trusts itself.
中文： 有个工程人员试图说服财务人员这笔钱应该花。但财务人员不懂工程，所以他无法判断这是否是花钱的好方法。而且，他们可能互不信任。我在一个地方拥有所有信息，同时做出工程和支出决策。我的大脑信任它自己。
English: I'm head engineer, chief designer, and CEO at SpaceX, so I don't have to cave to some money guy. I encounter CEOs who don't know the details of their technology, and that's ridiculous to me.
中文： 我是 SpaceX 的首席工程师、首席设计师和 CEO，所以我不必向某个财务人员屈服。我遇到过不知道技术细节的 CEO，这对我来说很荒谬。
English: To make the right decisions, you need to understand something at a detailed level.
中文： 要做出正确的决策，你需要在细节层面上理解某事。
Sleep on the Factory Floor
睡在工厂地板上
English: I've done many many stretches of one-hundred-hour weeks—true one-hundred-hour weeks, sleeping roughly six hours per day. I would not recommend that. That's for emergencies, not all the time.
中文： 我做过很多很多段每周一百小时的工作——真正的一百小时周，每天大约睡六小时。我不推荐那样。那是为了紧急情况，不是一直如此。
English: During difficult times at Tesla I've had to do it, and sometimes at the beginning of my earliest startups I did that. I wouldn't leave the office. I would sleep under my desk and work seven days a week. Sometimes it's necessary for success, or to avoid failure.
中文： 在特斯拉困难时期我不得不这样做，有时在我最早的创业初期我也那样做。我不会离开办公室。我会睡在办公桌下，每周工作七天。有时这对成功是必要的，或者为了避免失败。
English: Tesla is pretty far up there in terms of work ethic, anywhere in the world. The Tesla work ethic is substantially greater than any other large car or manufacturing company in the US, that I'm aware of.
中文： 特斯拉在职业道德方面相当靠前，在世界上任何地方都是如此。据我所知，特斯拉的职业道德远超过美国任何其他大型汽车或制造公司。
English: If there was a crisis situation, I slept on the floor. Most of the time I did not sleep in a conference room because people could not see me in the conference room—I slept on the floor in the factory. Otherwise how would people know? They wouldn't. Seeing is believing. I slept on the floor outside the conference room so they could see I was there.
中文： 如果有危机情况，我睡在地板上。大多数时候我不睡在会议室，因为人们在会议室看不到我——我睡在工厂的地板上。否则人们怎么会知道？他们不会。眼见为实。我睡在会议室外的地板上，这样他们就能看到我在那里。
English: When the team is being asked to work super hard, I have to be right there with them and they have to see it. If I fall asleep in the middle of the factory floor at four in the morning and wake up four hours later, they see that. They are like, "If the CEO is willing to take that level of pain, I can do it too."
中文： 当团队被要求超级努力地工作时，我必须和他们在一起，他们必须看到。如果我在凌晨四点睡在工厂地板中间，四小时后醒来，他们会看到。他们会想，"如果 CEO 愿意承受那种程度的痛苦，我也能做到。"
English: It was a world of hurt. I would wake up smelling like oil and iron filings. It was rough. But I was asking people to really go all out. I can't expect them to go all out if I'm not doing the same.
中文： 那是一个痛苦的世界。我醒来时身上有油和铁屑的味道。很艰难。但我要求人们真正全力以赴。如果我不这样做，我就不能期望他们全力以赴。
Frontline Leadership
一线领导力
English: Think about war. Do you want the general in some ivory tower or on the front lines? The troops fight harder if they see the general on the front lines. Nobody bleeds for the prince in the palace. Get out there on the front line. Show them that you care and that you're not in some plush office somewhere.
中文： 想想战争。你想要将军在象牙塔里还是在一线？如果士兵看到将军在一线，他们会更努力地战斗。没有人会为宫殿里的王子流血。到一线去。向他们表明你关心，你不在某个舒适的办公室里。
English: If they see the general out on the battlefield, the troops are going to be motivated. Wherever Napoleon was, that's where his armies would be at their best. Even if I don't do anything but show up, they'll look at me and know I wasn't spending all night partying.
中文： 如果他们看到将军在战场上，士兵们会受到鼓舞。拿破仑在哪里，他的军队就会在哪里表现最好。即使我什么都不做只是出现，他们会看着我，知道我没有整夜派对。
English: Never ask your troops to do something you're not willing to do. Whatever the people at the front lines are doing, I try to do it at least a few times myself.
中文： 永远不要要求你的士兵做你不愿意做的事情。一线人员在做什么，我尽量自己至少做几次。
English: It is my firm belief that the separation of the workplace into "executives" and "employees" does not create a good working environment. We want to create a system of equality without artificial barriers, so someone can start as a trainee and one day lead the entire company.
中文： 我坚信将工作场所分为"高管"和"员工"不会创造良好的工作环境。我们想创造一个平等的制度，没有人为障碍，这样有人可以从实习生开始，有一天领导整个公司。
English: This is why we eliminate all special privileges of executives. Everyone has equal access to parking, eating at the same tables, and there are no management offices. I am convinced that managers should work at the forefront, in the same work environment as the entire team. Even though I run a company, I still do not have my own office and often move my workplace to the most challenging area in the factory.
中文： 这就是为什么我们消除高管的所有特殊特权。每个人都有平等的停车权限，在同一张桌子吃饭，没有管理办公室。我坚信管理者应该在最前沿工作，与整个团队在相同的工作环境中。即使我经营一家公司，我仍然没有自己的办公室，经常把我的工作场所搬到工厂最具挑战性的区域。
English: Managers should always take care of their team before they take care of themselves. The supervisor is there to serve his team, not the other way round.
中文： 管理者应该总是在照顾自己之前先照顾他们的团队。主管在那里服务他的团队，而不是相反。
English: All technical managers must have hands-on experience. For example, managers of software teams must spend at least 20 percent of their time coding. Solar roof managers must spend time on the roofs doing installations. Otherwise, they are like a cavalry leader who can't ride a horse or a general who can't use a sword.
中文： 所有技术管理者必须有实践经验。例如，软件团队的管理者必须花费至少 20% 的时间编码。太阳能屋顶管理者必须花时间在屋顶上做安装。否则，他们就像不会骑马的骑兵领袖或不会用剑的将军。
English: Always be smashing your ego. Internalize responsibility. Whether you're a CEO or any other role, do whatever it takes to succeed.
中文： 永远要粉碎你的自我。内化责任。无论你是 CEO 还是任何其他角色，做任何需要的事情来成功。
English: A major failure mode is a high ego-to-ability ratio. If your ego-to-ability ratio gets too high, then you've broken the feedback loop to reality.
中文： 一个主要的失败模式是高自我与能力比率。如果你的自我与能力比率变得太高，那么你就破坏了对现实的反馈循环。
English: In AI terms, you'll break your reinforcement learning (RL) loop. You want to have a strong RL loop, which means internalizing responsibility and minimizing ego.
中文： 用 AI 术语来说，你会破坏你的强化学习（RL）循环。你想要有一个强大的 RL 循环，这意味着内化责任和最小化自我。
English: Do whatever the task is, whether grand or humble.
中文： 做任何任务，无论是宏伟还是卑微。
Adversity Forges Strength
逆境锻造力量
English: There is a great quote from Winston Churchill: "If you're going through hell, keep going."
中文： 温斯顿·丘吉尔有一句名言："如果你正在经历地狱，继续前进。"
English: Q: Do you think overcoming challenges is something innate in your personality?
中文： 问：你认为克服挑战是你性格中固有的东西吗？
English: I was driven as a kid, very willful. One story I remember: At age six, I was grounded for some reason. I don't remember why, but I felt it was unjust. I really wanted to go to my cousin's birthday party. I escaped from my nanny and walked across the city.
中文： 我小时候很有动力，非常任性。我记得一个故事：六岁时，我因为某种原因被禁足。我不记得为什么，但我觉得这不公正。我真的很想去参加我表哥的生日派对。我从保姆那里逃出来，穿过了城市。
English: I was just learning to read, so I could barely read the road signs. This was foolish, and something terrible could have happened. But I was so determined I walked clear across the capital city of South Africa at six years old.
中文： 我刚刚学习阅读，所以我几乎看不懂路标。这很愚蠢，可能发生可怕的事情。但我如此决心，六岁时我走遍了南非首都。
English: It was ten or twelve miles, much farther than I realized, and it took me about four hours. As my mom was leaving the party with my brother and sister, she saw me walking down the road and freaked out. So I climbed a tree and refused to come down until she promised not to punish me.
中文： 那是十到十二英里，比我意识到的远得多，花了我大约四个小时。当我妈妈带着我的兄弟姐妹离开派对时，她看到我走在路上，吓坏了。所以我爬上一棵树，拒绝下来，直到她答应不惩罚我。
English: I seem to have a high, innate drive, and that's been true even since I was a little kid.
中文： 我似乎有很高的先天驱动力，这从我小时候就是如此。
English: When I was five or six, I thought I was insane. It became clear other people's minds weren't exploding with ideas all the time. I felt strange. It's hard to turn it off. It might sound great when it is on. But what if it doesn't turn off? It's like a never-ending explosion.
中文： 当我五六岁时，我以为我疯了。很明显其他人的头脑不会一直充满想法。我感觉很奇怪。很难关掉它。当它开启时可能听起来很棒。但如果它不关闭呢？这就像一场永无止境的爆炸。
English: I was the youngest kid in my grade, so I was quite small. I was kind of a smart aleck, too. It was a recipe for disaster. I'd get called every name in the book and beaten up. Being small and having violent bullies is a bad situation.
中文： 我是年级里最小的孩子，所以我很小。我也有点自作聪明。这是灾难的配方。我会被骂遍所有难听的话并被殴打。个子小又有暴力的霸凌者是个糟糕的情况。
English: There was a level of violence in my childhood that wouldn't be tolerated in any American school. It was like Lord of the Flies. There were a couple of gangs that were pretty evil, and I was one of their chosen victims. Partly because I stuck up for another kid they were relentless on, that made me a target.
中文： 我童年时期有一定程度的暴力，这在美国任何学校都不会被容忍。这就像《蝇王》。有几个相当邪恶的帮派，我是他们选定的受害者之一。部分因为我保护另一个被他们无情对待的孩子，这让我成为了目标。
English: The place where I grew up in South Africa was very violent. Fighting was normal, it was part of the culture. It'll certainly toughen you up; that's for sure. I was in a lot of fights I didn't want to be in. I got beaten up really badly in a few of them. I was in real hardcore street fights, from about six to sixteen.
中文： 我在南非长大的地方非常暴力。打架是正常的，它是文化的一部分。这肯定会让你变得坚强；这是肯定的。我参加了很多我不想参加的打架。其中有几次我被打得很惨。我经历了真正的硬核街头斗殴，从大约六岁到十六岁。
English: I was almost beaten to death—within an inch of my life at one point.
中文： 我几乎被打死——有一次只差一英寸就死了。
English: I got to a reasonably good size around fifteen, and around sixteen they stopped trying to beat me up, because it didn't work out so well for them anymore.
中文： 我在十五岁左右长得相当壮实，大约十六岁时他们不再试图打我，因为那对他们来说不再那么顺利了。
English: People say they're worried about the damage of words. People worried about words have never been punched in the face. Once you've been punched in the face, real hard, right on the nose—you'll take any words over that.
中文： 人们说他们担心言语的伤害。担心言语的人从未被打过脸。一旦你被狠狠地打在脸上，正好打在鼻子上——你会选择任何言语而不是那个。
English: Adversity shaped me. My pain threshold became very high.
中文： 逆境塑造了我。我的疼痛阈值变得非常高。
Eat Glass and Stare into the Abyss
吃玻璃并凝视深渊
English: When starting a company, usually the beginning is fun. Then, it's hellish for a number of years.
中文： 创办公司时，通常开始很有趣。然后，会有几年是地狱般的。
English: You have to be focused on the short term and money coming in when creating a company, because otherwise the company will die. People think, "Oh, creating a company will be fun." It's not. There are periods of fun, and there are periods where it's just awful.
中文： 创办公司时，你必须专注于短期和资金流入，否则公司会死。人们想，"哦，创办公司会很有趣。"不是的。有有趣的时期，也有非常糟糕的时期。
English: You have to feel quite compelled to start a company. You must have a high pain threshold. My friend Bill Lee says, "Starting a company is like eating glass and staring into the abyss." There's some truth to that.
中文： 你必须感到相当有冲动去创办公司。你必须有高疼痛阈值。我的朋友比尔·李说，"创办公司就像吃玻璃并凝视深渊。"这有些道理。
English: "Staring into the abyss'" means you're going to be constantly facing the extermination of the company. Most startups fail. It's like 90 percent—it could be 99 percent of startups fail. You're constantly saying, "If I don't get this right, the company will die." This can be quite stressful.
中文： "凝视深渊"意味着你将不断面对公司的灭亡。大多数初创公司失败。大约 90%——可能是 99% 的初创公司失败。你不断地说，"如果我不把这做好，公司就会死。"这可能非常有压力。
English: "Eating glass" means you've got to work on the problems the company needs you to work on, not the problems you want to work on. You end up working on problems you wish you weren't working on. That's "eating glass," and it goes on for a long time.
中文： "吃玻璃"意味着你必须处理公司需要你处理的问题，而不是你想处理的问题。你最终在处理你希望不必处理的问题。那就是"吃玻璃"，它会持续很长时间。
English: We were facing imminent death at SpaceX, Tesla, and SolarCity for a long time. We're no longer staring directly into the abyss, which is great. It is there in the distance, but I'm not staring right at it. There's always going to be some amount of glass that has to be chewed. But it's less and less as time goes by.
中文： 我们在 SpaceX、特斯拉和 SolarCity 面临迫在眉睫的死亡很长时间了。我们不再直接凝视深渊，这很好。它在远处，但我不再直视它。总会有一些玻璃必须咀嚼。但随着时间的推移，它越来越少。
English: If you don't eat the glass, you're not going to be successful.
中文： 如果你不吃玻璃，你就不会成功。
English: Q: How do you keep your focus on the big picture when you're constantly faced with being bankrupt in a month?
中文： 问：当你不断面临一个月内破产时，你如何保持对大局的关注？
English: A very small percentage of mental energy is spent on the big picture. You know where you're generally heading, and the actual path is going to be a zigzag in that direction. You're trying not to deviate too far from the path you want to be on, but you have to, to some degree.
中文： 只有很小比例的精神精力花在大局上。你知道你大致要去哪里，实际路径会是在那个方向上的之字形。你试图不偏离你想走的路太远，但你必须在某种程度上这样做。
English: Failure is not good. Failure is bad. But if something is important enough, then you do it, even though the risk of failure is high. My advice for somebody who wants to start a company: Bear in mind, the most likely outcome is failure. Reconcile yourself to that strong possibility, and only if you still feel compelled to, do it.
中文： 失败不好。失败是坏事。但如果某事足够重要，那么你就去做，即使失败的风险很高。我对想创办公司的人的建议：记住，最可能的结果是失败。让自己接受那种强烈的可能性，只有如果你仍然感到有冲动，才去做。
English: That said, many people fear starting a company too much. What's the worst that could happen? You're not gonna starve to death; you're not gonna die of exposure—really, what's the worst that could happen?
中文： 话虽如此，许多人过于害怕创办公司。最坏的情况是什么？你不会饿死；你不会冻死——真的，最坏的情况是什么？
BUILDING EXCEPTIONAL TEAMS
打造卓越团队
English: The most important thing is to attract great people. Whether you are creating a company or joining a company, find an amazing group that you really respect.
中文： 最重要的是吸引优秀的人。无论你是在创建公司还是加入公司，找到一个你真正尊敬的惊人团队。
A Group with a Goal
有目标的团队
English: A company is just a bunch of people coming together to create a product or service. There's no such thing as "a business," just a group pursuing a goal.
中文： 公司只是一群人聚在一起创造产品或服务。没有"企业"这种东西，只是一个追求目标的群体。
English: How talented and hardworking that group is, and the degree to which they are focused cohesively in a good direction, will determine the success of the company. If you're creating a company, or if you're joining a company, the most important thing is to attract great people.
中文： 这个团队有多么有才华和勤奋，以及他们在多大程度上凝聚在一个好的方向上，将决定公司的成功。如果你在创建公司，或者如果你在加入公司，最重要的是吸引优秀的人。
English: A company is essentially a cybernetic collective of people and machines. This collective is far smarter than an individual.
中文： 公司本质上是一个人和机器的控制论集体。这个集体远比个人聪明。
English: That's what a company is, and there are different levels of complexity in the way companies are formed.
中文： 这就是公司是什么，公司形成的方式有不同层次的复杂性。
English: Obviously, one person can't build a whole rocket, engines, launchpad, and everything. That's impossible. We have thousands of people at SpaceX. By piecing it out to different people and using our collection of computers, tools, and machines we can make lots of rockets, launch them into orbit, dock with the International Space Station, and more.
中文： 显然，一个人不能建造整个火箭、发动机、发射台和所有东西。那是不可能的。我们在 SpaceX 有数千人。通过将其分配给不同的人并使用我们的计算机、工具和机器集合，我们可以制造很多火箭，将它们发射到轨道上，与国际空间站对接，等等。
English: People sometimes forget a company is just a group of people gathered together to make products for fellow human beings. As long as they make great products, the company will have great value.
中文： 人们有时会忘记公司只是一群人聚集在一起为其他人类制造产品。只要他们制造出伟大的产品，公司就会有巨大的价值。
English: To create a company, you have to convince others to join you in your effort. You have to convince them there is a reasonable chance of success and if there is success, the reward will be commensurate with the effort.
中文： 要创建公司，你必须说服其他人加入你的努力。你必须说服他们有一个合理的成功机会，如果有成功，回报将与努力相称。
English: If you're going to create a company, the first thing you should try to do is create a working prototype.
中文： 如果你要创建公司，你应该尝试做的第一件事是创建一个可工作的原型。
English: When starting a company, create a demonstration, a mock-up, or a sketch. This helps people envision it. Try to get to that point as soon as possible, then iterate to make it as real as possible as fast as possible.
中文： 创办公司时，创建一个演示、模型或草图。这有助于人们设想它。尽快达到那个点，然后迭代使其尽可能真实、尽可能快。
English: It doesn't sink in for people until you actually have a physical object they can use. Even when you can show something works on paper, and the calculations are clear, it's not the same.
中文： 直到你真正有一个他们可以使用的实物，人们才会理解。即使你能在纸上展示某些东西可行，计算也很清楚，但这是不一样的。
English: Anything can look good on PowerPoint. If you have an actual demonstration, even in primitive form, it is much more effective in convincing people.
中文： 任何事情在 PowerPoint 上看起来都可以很好。如果你有一个实际的演示，即使是原始形式，它在说服人们方面也要有效得多。
English: Fundamentally, if you don't have a compelling product at a compelling price, you don't have a great company.
中文： 从根本上说，如果你没有一个在价格上有吸引力的引人注目的产品，你就没有一家伟大的公司。
Create a Culture of Builders
创造建造者文化
English: I consider one of my core responsibilities as CEO is to have an environment where great engineers can flourish.
中文： 我认为我作为 CEO 的核心职责之一是创造一个让优秀工程师能够茁壮成长的环境。
English: I don't think I manage smart people; they manage themselves. If someone is smart and talented, they can go anywhere and do anything, anytime.
中文： 我不认为我管理聪明人；他们管理自己。如果有人聪明且有才华，他们可以随时去任何地方做任何事情。
English: I say, "Look, this is the goal we're after. Do you agree with this goal? If you do, then let's try to get it done."
中文： 我说，"看，这就是我们追求的目标。你同意这个目标吗？如果同意，那么让我们努力完成它。"
English: I'll provide my opinion along the way. But it's rare for me to actually insist on a particular thing. Once in a while I'll say, "You have to trust me on this one. We have to do this, and if it turns out to be a bad decision, we can all hold it against me in the future."
中文： 我会在此过程中提供我的意见。但我很少真正坚持某件特定的事情。偶尔我会说，"这件事你必须相信我。我们必须这样做，如果结果证明这是一个糟糕的决定，我们将来都可以怪我。"
English: Another important principle: You want everyone to be able to think like the chief engineer. They need to understand the system at a high level, well enough to know when they are making a bad optimization.
中文： 另一个重要原则：你希望每个人都能够像首席工程师一样思考。他们需要在高层次上理解系统，足够好地知道他们何时在做糟糕的优化。
English: Since a company is a group of people assembled to create a product or service, the ability to attract and motivate great people is critical to the success of a company. That's the purpose of a company. People sometimes forget this elementary truth.
中文： 由于公司是一群聚集在一起创造产品或服务的人，吸引和激励优秀人才的能力对公司的成功至关重要。这就是公司的目的。人们有时会忘记这个基本真理。
English: If you're able to get talented, hard-working people to join the company, work together, and have a relentless sense of perfection toward a common goal, you will end up with a great product. If you have a great product, lots of people will buy it, and the company will be successful.
中文： 如果你能够让有才华、勤奋的人加入公司，一起工作，并对共同目标有不懈的完美追求，你最终会得到一个伟大的产品。如果你有一个伟大的产品，很多人会购买它，公司就会成功。
English: That's why our most important consideration is recruiting the best people. The output of any company is the vector sum of the people within it. If we attract the most talented people over time and our direction is correctly aligned, we will prevail.
中文： 这就是为什么我们最重要的考虑是招聘最优秀的人。任何公司的产出都是其中人员的矢量和。如果我们随着时间的推移吸引最有才华的人，并且我们的方向正确对齐，我们将获胜。
English: A small group of technically strong people will always beat a large group of moderately strong people.
中文： 一小群技术强大的人总是会击败一大群中等强大的人。
English: What you see at SpaceX is the result of an incredible team. Supertalented people who work like crazy to advance technology. They make this happen. My role is to make sure they have an environment where their talents can come to the fore. I can't tell you how honored and grateful I am to work with such a great team.
中文： 你在 SpaceX 看到的是令人难以置信的团队的结果。超级有才华的人疯狂地工作以推进技术。他们让这成为现实。我的角色是确保他们有一个能让他们的才能脱颖而出的环境。我无法告诉你与这样伟大的团队一起工作我感到多么荣幸和感激。
English: Do everything you can to gather great people.
中文： 尽一切努力聚集优秀的人。
English: Many companies suppress their talented, driven engineers. Some are suppressed by being so comfortable they don't produce much. There are a few places in Silicon Valley with good engineers—but what are they producing? The output of that engineering talent seems low, though maybe they are enjoying themselves.
中文： 许多公司压制他们有才华、有动力的工程师。有些人因为太舒适而被压制，他们产出不多。硅谷有几个地方有好的工程师——但他们在生产什么？那些工程人才的产出似乎很低，尽管也许他们很享受。
English: Tesla is not like that. We're demanding. You're going to get a lot done and it's going to be cool work, but it's not going to be easy. At Tesla, a superb engineer's talents are used to a greater degree than anywhere else.
中文： 特斯拉不是那样的。我们要求很高。你会完成很多工作，这会很酷，但不会容易。在特斯拉，优秀工程师的才能比在任何其他地方都得到更大程度的发挥。
English: Tesla has been like a whole series of startups. So far almost all have been quite successful, so we must be doing something right.
中文： 特斯拉就像一系列初创公司。到目前为止，几乎所有都相当成功，所以我们一定在做一些正确的事情。
English: Only exceptional performance constitutes a passing grade.
中文： 只有卓越的表现才算及格。
Recruit for Exceptional Ability
招聘非凡能力
English: When hiring, I look for evidence of exceptional ability, or at least exceptional aspiration.
中文： 招聘时，我寻找非凡能力的证据，或者至少非凡的抱负。
English: Sometimes these things get messed up in recruiting. I sometimes wonder, "If Nikola Tesla applied to Tesla, would we even give him an interview?" It's not clear. They might say, "This guy came from some weird college in Eastern Europe, he's got some odd mannerisms, we don't know if we should give him an interview." I worry that's what we'd do. Our response should be, "Man, Nikola Tesla, this kid's super smart. What does he want? We'll pay him anything!"
中文： 有时这些事情在招聘中会搞砸。我有时会想，"如果尼古拉·特斯拉申请特斯拉，我们会给他面试机会吗？"这不清楚。他们可能会说，"这家伙来自东欧某个奇怪的大学，他有一些奇怪的举止，我们不知道是否应该给他面试。"我担心我们会那样做。我们的反应应该是，"天哪，尼古拉·特斯拉，这家伙超级聪明。他想要什么？我们愿意付他任何报酬！"
English: I always ask my teams to give a lot of thought to who should join. I recommend paying close attention to people who haven't completed their grad or even undergrad, but are obviously brilliant. Better to have them join before they achieve a breakthrough.
中文： 我总是要求我的团队认真思考谁应该加入。我建议密切关注那些没有完成研究生甚至本科，但显然很聪明的人。最好在他们取得突破之前让他们加入。
English: You've got to be willing to recruit hard for excellent people. When I was interviewing Bülent Altan for SpaceX, I told him, "I heard you don't want to move to Los Angeles because your wife works for Google in San Francisco. Well, I just talked to Larry Page, and they're going to transfer your wife down to LA. So what are you going to do now?" He said he would come work for SpaceX.
中文： 你必须愿意努力招聘优秀的人。当我为 SpaceX 面试布伦特·阿尔坦时，我告诉他，"我听说你不想搬到洛杉矶，因为你的妻子在旧金山为谷歌工作。好吧，我刚刚和拉里·佩奇谈过，他们会把你的妻子调到洛杉矶。那你现在要做什么？"他说他会来为 SpaceX 工作。
English: I have a great ability to tell if someone is a good engineer or not. And I am good at optimizing the efficiency of an engineering team. It helps that I'm quite good at engineering in general.
中文： 我有很强的能力判断某人是否是好的工程师。我擅长优化工程团队的效率。一般来说，我很擅长工程，这很有帮助。
English: In interviews, I ask people to tell me the story of their career and some of the tougher problems they dealt with, how they dealt with those, and how they made decisions at key transition points. Usually that's enough for me to get a good gut feeling about someone. What I'm really looking for is evidence of exceptional ability. Did they face difficult problems and overcome them?
中文： 在面试中，我要求人们告诉我他们职业生涯的故事以及他们处理的一些更棘手的问题，他们如何处理这些问题，以及他们如何在关键转折点做出决策。通常这足以让我对某人有一个好的直觉。我真正寻找的是非凡能力的证据。他们是否面临困难问题并克服了它们？
English: Usually the person who had to struggle with the problem really understands it and they don't forget if it was difficult. Ask them detailed questions about it, and they'll know the answers. A person who was not responsible for that accomplishment will not know the details.
中文： 通常，不得不与问题斗争的人真正理解它，他们不会忘记是否困难。问他们关于它的详细问题，他们会知道答案。一个不对该成就负责的人不会知道细节。
Retain Only Special Forces
只保留特种部队
English: I worked very hard to collect the right expertise when starting SpaceX. I tried hard to find a great chief engineer for the rocket, but good chief engineers wouldn't join and there is no point in hiring the bad ones. I ended up being chief engineer of the rocket. If I could have found somebody better, maybe we would have had fewer than three failures.
中文： 创办 SpaceX 时，我非常努力地收集正确的专业知识。我努力想为火箭找到一位伟大的首席工程师，但好的首席工程师不愿意加入，雇佣差的也没有意义。我最终成为了火箭的首席工程师。如果我能找到更好的人，也许我们的失败会少于三次。
English: Wherever the smartest, most driven people are choosing to work, that company is going to win.
中文： 无论最聪明、最有动力的人选择在哪里工作，那家公司都会获胜。
English: My philosophy for companies in the startup phase is a "Special Forces" approach. The minimum passing grade is excellent. I believe that's the culture companies need to have if they're going to become successful.
中文： 我对初创阶段公司的理念是"特种部队"方法。最低及格分数是优秀。我相信这是公司要想成功必须拥有的文化。
English: Q: Is building great teams and products just a question of being well funded?
中文： 问：打造伟大团队和产品只是资金充足的问题吗？
English: It's not like if we just had more money we could spend it effectively on R&D. That's not how it works. If there was a factory producing excellent engineers, that would be true. Except this factory doesn't exist. It's incredibly difficult to find the right talent, integrate them into an organization, and have it work effectively. Money is not the constraint.
中文： 不是像如果我们有更多钱就能有效地花在研发上那样。不是那样运作的。如果有一个工厂生产优秀工程师，那会是真的。但这个工厂不存在。找到合适的人才，将他们整合到组织中，并使其有效运作是极其困难的。钱不是限制。
English: There are only a small number of excellent people, and they're hard to find. Engineers especially. At the end of the day, the competitiveness of any company is a function of the most talented and driven people. That is the team that's going to win.
中文： 只有少数优秀的人，他们很难找到。尤其是工程师。归根结底，任何公司的竞争力都是最有才华和最有动力的人的函数。那就是会获胜的团队。
English: The fundamental limitation is exceptional engineers. There are not that many.
中文： 根本限制是卓越的工程师。没有那么多。
English: Having a strong sense of purpose will attract the very best talent in the world. If the work is enjoyable, the financial rewards are good, and the product will change the world—that's a pretty powerful set of motivators.
中文： 拥有强烈的目标感将吸引世界上最优秀的人才。如果工作令人愉快，财务回报丰厚，产品将改变世界——这是一套非常强大的激励因素。
English: I've made several hiring decisions where I valued intellect over heart and I think that was a mistake. I have tried to adjust accordingly. It matters whether somebody is a good person.
中文： 我曾做过几次招聘决定，我看重智力胜过品格，我认为那是个错误。我试图相应地调整。某人是否是好人很重要。
English: One test for assessing someone's character is to look at the character of their friends and associates. While people can put up a mask themselves for their character, their friends and associates will not. You can judge a person's character by their associates and to some degree by their enemies. If evil people hate you, you might be doing something right.
中文： 评估某人品格的一个测试是看他们的朋友和同事的品格。虽然人们可以为自己的品格戴上面具，但他们的朋友和同事不会。你可以通过一个人的同事来判断他的品格，在某种程度上也可以通过他的敌人。如果邪恶的人恨你，你可能在做一些正确的事情。
English: When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant.
中文： 招聘时，寻找态度正确的人。技能可以教授。态度改变需要大脑移植。
Feedback over Feelings
反馈胜过感受
English: Physics does not care about hurt feelings. It cares about whether you got the rocket right.
中文： 物理学不在乎受伤的感情。它在乎你是否把火箭做对了。
English: All bad news should be given loudly and often. Good news can be said quietly and once.
中文： 所有坏消息都应该大声且经常地传达。好消息可以安静地说一次。
English: I give people hardcore feedback, but I try to always focus on the substance of the discussion. I try to criticize the action, not the person. We all make mistakes. What matters is whether a person has a good feedback loop, can seek criticism from others, and can improve.
中文： 我给人们硬核的反馈，但我尽量总是关注讨论的实质。我尽量批评行为，而不是人。我们都会犯错。重要的是一个人是否有良好的反馈循环，能否寻求他人的批评，并能否改进。
English: It's not your job to make people on your team love you. In fact, that's counterproductive. I had a manager who would not fire anyone. I told him, "You can't tell people they have to get their shit together, and when they don't get their shit together—nothing happens to them."
中文： 让你的团队成员爱你不是你的工作。事实上，那会适得其反。我有一个经理不愿意解雇任何人。我告诉他，"你不能告诉人们他们必须振作起来，而当他们没有振作起来时——对他们没有任何后果。"
English: Camaraderie is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other's work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided. Wanting to be everyone's friend leads you to care too much about the emotions of the individual in front of you rather than caring about the success of the whole enterprise. Focusing on that one individual can lead to a far greater number of people being hurt.
中文： 友情是危险的。它使人们难以挑战彼此的工作。有一种倾向是不想把同事推到车下。这需要避免。想成为每个人的朋友会导致你过于关心面前个人的情绪，而不是关心整个企业的成功。专注于那一个人可能导致更多的人受到伤害。
English: I think it's a real weakness to want to be liked. A real weakness. And I do not have that.
中文： 我认为想被喜欢是一个真正的弱点。一个真正的弱点。而我没有那个。
DESIGNING THE ORGANIZATION
设计组织
English: It must be okay for people to talk directly and make the right thing happen.
中文： 人们必须能够直接交谈并让正确的事情发生。
Remove Organizational Boundaries
消除组织边界
English: In any product, you can see the errors in the organization's structure. They will manifest themselves in the product.
中文： 在任何产品中，你都能看到组织结构中的错误。它们会在产品中表现出来。
English: A major source of issues is poor communication between departments. The way to solve this is to allow free flow of information between all levels.
中文： 问题的一个主要来源是部门之间沟通不畅。解决这个问题的方法是允许信息在所有层级之间自由流动。
English: There are two schools of thought about how information should flow within companies. The most common way is chain of command. That means you always flow communication through your manager. The problem with this approach is that, while it serves to enhance the power of the manager, it fails to serve the company.
中文： 关于信息如何在公司内部流动有两种思想流派。最常见的方式是指挥链。这意味着你总是通过你的经理进行沟通。这种方法的问题是，虽然它有助于增强经理的权力，但它不能为公司服务。
English: If, in order to get something done between departments, an individual contributor has to talk to their manager, who talks to a director, who talks to a VP, who talks to another VP, who talks to a director, who talks to a manager, who talks to someone doing the actual work, then superdumb things will happen. Then the info has to flow back the other way again. This is incredibly dumb.
中文： 如果为了在部门之间完成某事，一个个人贡献者必须与他们的经理交谈，经理与总监交谈，总监与副总裁交谈，副总裁与另一个副总裁交谈，另一个副总裁与总监交谈，总监与经理交谈，经理与做实际工作的人交谈，那么超级愚蠢的事情会发生。然后信息必须再以相反的方式流回。这非常愚蠢。
English: Problems get solved quickly when a person just talks to a person in another department and makes the right thing happen. Anyone can and should talk to anyone else according to what they think is the fastest way to solve a problem for the benefit of the whole company. You can talk to your manager's manager without his permission. You can talk directly to a VP in another department. You can talk to me.
中文： 当一个人只是与另一个部门的人交谈并让正确的事情发生时，问题会迅速解决。任何人都可以且应该与其他任何人交谈，按照他们认为对整个公司最有利的最快方式解决问题。你可以在没有经理许可的情况下与你经理的经理交谈。你可以直接与另一个部门的副总裁交谈。你可以与我交谈。
English: Communication should travel via the shortest path necessary to get the job done, not through the "chain of command."
中文： 沟通应该通过完成工作所需的最短路径进行，而不是通过"指挥链"。
English: Any manager who attempts to enforce "chain of command" communication will soon find themselves working elsewhere. You can talk to anyone without anyone else's permission. Moreover, you should consider yourself obligated to do so until the right thing happens. Always view yourself as working for the good of the company and never your department.
中文： 任何试图强制执行"指挥链"沟通的经理很快就会发现自己要在其他地方工作了。你可以在没有其他人许可的情况下与任何人交谈。此外，你应该认为自己有义务这样做，直到正确的事情发生。始终将自己视为为公司利益工作，而不是为你的部门工作。
English: How can it possibly help Tesla for departments to erect barriers between themselves or see their success as relative within the company instead of collective? We are all in the same boat. Managers should work hard to ensure they are not creating silos within the company that create an us-versus-them mentality or impede communication in any way. This is a natural tendency and needs to be actively fought.
中文： 部门之间树立壁垒或将他们的成功视为公司内部相对而非集体，怎么可能帮助特斯拉？我们都在同一条船上。管理者应该努力确保他们不在公司内部制造孤岛，从而产生我们对他们的 mentality 或以任何方式阻碍沟通。这是一种自然倾向，需要积极抵制。
English: The point is ensuring we execute ultrafast and well.
中文： 重点是确保我们超快速且良好地执行。
English: Q: How do boundaries between departments affect product development?
中文： 问：部门之间的边界如何影响产品开发？
English: You can see the organizational boundaries in the product. You'll often get a box in a box. You realize, "Why is this thing in two boxes?" Turns out, because both teams thought they needed an enclosure, the product ends up with an enclosure in an enclosure.
中文： 你可以在产品中看到组织边界。你经常会得到一个盒子里的盒子。你意识到，"为什么这个东西在两个盒子里？"结果是，因为两个团队都认为他们需要一个外壳，产品最终变成了外壳里的外壳。
English: One case from the Tesla Model 3: The battery pack had a top enclosure and the car also has an underbody, right above it. What's the point of that? That doesn't make any sense, but because one team enclosed the battery pack and another team wanted to have an enclosed body, it happened.
中文： 特斯拉 Model 3 的一个案例：电池组有一个顶部外壳，汽车也有一个底部车身，就在它上面。那有什么意义？这没有任何意义，但因为一个团队封闭了电池组，另一个团队想要有一个封闭的车身，它就发生了。
English: It makes sense from an individual team's perspective, but you don't need a cover on the battery—there's a car on top of it. Putting the cover on the battery pack adds mass and cost, so it should be deleted.
中文： 从单个团队的角度来看是有意义的，但你不需要在电池上加盖——上面有一辆车。在电池组上加盖增加了质量和成本，所以应该删除它。
English: Find the design necessity of every part and every process.
中文： 找出每个部件和每个过程的设计必要性。
English: Occasionally something seems necessary at the design level but turns out unnecessary in manufacturing. Connect designers and manufacturers to make sure they communicate often. The people on the assembly line should be able to immediately grab a designer or engineer and say, "WHY DID YOU MAKE IT THIS WAY!?'
中文： 偶尔有些东西在设计层面看起来必要，但在制造中却不必要。连接设计师和制造商，确保他们经常沟通。装配线上的人应该能够立即抓住设计师或工程师说，"你为什么这样设计！"
English: If your hand is on a stove and it gets hot, you pull it right off. But if it's someone else's hand on the stove, it will take you longer to do something about it.
中文： 如果你的手在炉子上，它变热了，你会立刻拿开。但如果是别人的手在炉子上，你需要更长时间才能做些什么。
English: You cannot separate design, engineering, and manufacturing. They need to be together because you are going to make mistakes. You want to identify and fix those mistakes today, right now. And if you separate them, the mistakes will fester. Let the manufacturers put the designers' hands on the stove too.
中文： 你不能将设计、工程和制造分开。他们需要在一起，因为你会犯错。你想今天、现在就识别并修复这些错误。如果你分开它们，错误会恶化。让制造商也把设计师的手放在炉子上。
English: Whenever there are problems to solve, don't just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the level right below your managers.
中文： 每当有问题要解决时，不要只与你的经理会面。进行跨级会面，与你经理下面的级别会面。
English: Physically go to where the problem is, immediately.
中文： 亲自去问题所在的地方，立即。
English: One of my rules is "Go as close to the source as possible." We were trying to determine how thick Starship's walls should be. Rather than only talking to the company's executives, I talked to some of the workers actually doing the welding. I asked what they thought was safe. The line workers thought the tank walls could get as thin as 4.8 millimeters.
中文： 我的一个规则是"尽可能接近源头"。我们试图确定星舰的墙壁应该有多厚。我没有只与公司高管交谈，而是与一些实际进行焊接的工人交谈。我问他们认为什么是安全的。流水线工人认为罐壁可以薄至 4.8 毫米。
English: "What about four?" I asked. "That would make us pretty nervous," the workers replied. "Okay," I said, "Let's try four millimeters." It worked.
中文： "四毫米怎么样？"我问。"那会让我们很紧张，"工人们回答。"好吧，"我说，"让我们试试四毫米。"它奏效了。
Simple Communication
简单沟通
English: Don't use acronyms or nonsense words for objects, software, or processes. In general, anything that requires an explanation inhibits communication. We don't want people to have to memorize a glossary just to function.
中文： 不要对物体、软件或过程使用首字母缩略词或无意义的词。一般来说，任何需要解释的事情都会阻碍沟通。我们不希望人们必须记住一个词汇表才能工作。
English: I noticed a creeping tendency to use made-up acronyms at SpaceX and Tesla. Excessive use of made-up acronyms is a significant impediment to communication, and keeping communication clear as we grow is incredibly important.
中文： 我注意到 SpaceX 和特斯拉有一种逐渐使用编造的首字母缩略词的倾向。过度使用编造的首字母缩略词是沟通的重大障碍，随着我们成长保持沟通清晰非常重要。
English: A few acronyms here and there may not seem so bad, but if a thousand people are making these up, over time the result will be a huge glossary that we have to issue to new employees. No one actually remembers all these acronyms, and people don't want to seem dumb in a meeting, so they just sit there in ignorance.
中文： 这里那里几个首字母缩略词可能看起来不那么糟糕，但如果一千个人在编造这些，随着时间的推移，结果将是一个我们必须发给新员工的巨大词汇表。没有人真正记得所有这些首字母缩略词，人们不想在会议上显得愚蠢，所以他们只是无知地坐在那里。
English: I told people the acronyms needed to stop immediately or I would take drastic action. Unless an acronym is approved by me, it should not enter the SpaceX glossary. If there is an existing acronym that cannot reasonably be justified, it should be eliminated.
中文： 我告诉人们首字母缩略词需要立即停止，否则我会采取严厉行动。除非首字母缩略词经过我批准，否则不应进入 SpaceX 词汇表。如果存在无法合理解释的首字母缩略词，应该消除它。
English: The key test for an acronym is to ask whether it helps or hurts communication. An acronym that most engineers outside of SpaceX already know, such as GUI (graphical user interface), is fine to use. It is also okay to use a few acronyms or contractions every now and again, assuming I have approved them. For example, we use MVac and M9 instead of Merlin 1C-Vacuum or Merlin 1C-Sea Level. But they need to be kept to a minimum.
中文： 首字母缩略词的关键测试是问它是帮助还是阻碍沟通。SpaceX 之外的大多数工程师已经知道的首字母缩略词，如 GUI（图形用户界面），可以使用。偶尔使用几个首字母缩略词或缩写也可以，假设我已经批准了它们。例如，我们使用 MVac 和 M9 而不是 Merlin 1C-Vacuum 或 Merlin 1C-Sea Level。但它们需要保持在最低限度。
English: The most simple, straightforward, low-ego terms are generally best. You want to close the loop on reality hard.
中文： 最简单、直接、低自我的术语通常最好。你想努力关闭现实循环。
Innovation Needs Permission to Fail
创新需要失败的许可
English: Failure is essentially irrelevant unless it is catastrophic.
中文： 失败本质上无关紧要，除非它是灾难性的。
English: You have to always look at the incentive structure of an organization and ask, "Is that organization properly incentivizing innovation?" We're looking for any possible action that can improve the probability of success, no matter how small. Whether that comes from an intern, me, or anyone else doesn't matter.
中文： 你必须始终查看组织的激励结构并问，"该组织是否适当激励创新？"我们正在寻找任何可能提高成功概率的行动，无论多么小。无论这来自实习生、我还是其他任何人都没关系。
English: When trying new things, you've got to have some acceptance of failure…failure must be an option. If failure is not an option, it's going to result in extremely conservative choices and you may get something even worse than lack of innovation—things may go backward.
中文： 尝试新事物时，你必须对失败有一定的接受度……失败必须是一个选项。如果失败不是一个选项，它将导致极其保守的选择，你可能会得到比缺乏创新更糟糕的东西——事情可能会倒退。
English: When we had early failures in the SpaceX flights, I didn't fire anyone responsible for those particular causes of failure. They could have made better decisions, but they were smart and hardworking. It just wouldn't have been fair in that situation. Letting people go is only fair if they can't get themselves motivated around the core mission or they're really not giving it everything they can.
中文： 当我们在 SpaceX 早期飞行中遇到失败时，我没有解雇那些对特定失败原因负责的人。他们本可以做出更好的决定，但他们聪明且勤奋。在这种情况下解雇他们是不公平的。只有当人们无法围绕核心任务激励自己或他们真的没有尽最大努力时，解雇他们才是公平的。
English: It's important to create an environment that fosters innovation, and you want to let it evolve in a Darwinian way. You don't want to pick one technology or path and decide that it will win, because it may not be the best option. Let things evolve.
中文： 创造一个培养创新的环境很重要，你想让它以达尔文式的方式进化。你不想选择一种技术或路径并决定它会获胜，因为它可能不是最好的选择。让事情自然进化。
English: With innovation and new technology, you don't know what the path is—there's no map. By nature it's unknown, which means you're going to make false moves. It must be culturally acceptable to make false moves.
中文： 对于创新和新技术，你不知道路径是什么——没有地图。本质上它是未知的，这意味着你会做出错误的举动。在文化上必须接受做出错误举动。
English: So to provide support for innovation, make sure the penalty for failure is low. You don't want the response to failure to be too punitive. That's one of the keys to Silicon Valley's success. There are many founders who've built successful companies after a previous company failed. They quickly reconstituted. People left and joined other companies. That's critical.
中文： 因此，为了支持创新，确保失败的惩罚很低。你不希望对失败的反应过于惩罚性。这是硅谷成功的关键之一。有许多创始人在前一家公司失败后建立了成功的公司。他们迅速重组。人们离开并加入其他公司。这很关键。
English: If you punish people too much for failure, then they will respond accordingly, and the innovation you get will be incremental. Nobody's going to try anything bold for fear of getting fired or being punished in some way. If you expect innovation, the compensation structure must reflect that. The risk-reward must favor taking bold moves.
中文： 如果你因失败而过多惩罚人们，那么他们会相应地回应，你得到的创新将是渐进式的。没有人会尝试任何大胆的事情，因为害怕被解雇或以某种方式受到惩罚。如果你期望创新，薪酬结构必须反映这一点。风险回报必须有利于采取大胆行动。
English: Failure is a side effect of iteration. I once told a discouraged engineer, "If you can't tell me the four ways you fucked something up before you got it right, you weren't the one doing the real work."
中文： 失败是迭代的副作用。我曾经告诉一位沮丧的工程师，"如果你不能告诉我你在做对之前搞砸的四件事，那你就不是真正做工作的人。"
English: If we're not occasionally blowing up an engine on the test stand, we're not trying hard enough.
中文： 如果我们不是偶尔在测试台上炸毁发动机，我们就没有足够努力。
English: Q: Why is it so hard to predict what will work and what won't?
中文： 问：为什么如此难以预测什么会成功什么不会？
English: We do as much as we can on the ground and in simulations, but a lot of factors can't be simulated. A design might work in simulation or the test stand, but not in a real flight. There's no test stand that can test a rocket at 17,000 mph, doing six Gs in every different orientation. It's not possible.
中文： 我们在地面和模拟中尽可能多地做，但很多因素无法模拟。设计可能在模拟或测试台中有效，但在实际飞行中无效。没有测试台可以在 17,000 英里/小时的速度下测试火箭，在每个不同方向承受 6G。这是不可能的。
English: After we fly a mission, hundreds of changes take place. Not a few. Hundreds. If you go to a detailed level across the ship, booster, and engines, there might be thousands of changes between flights. I'm just talking hardware here; software changes even more.
中文： 在我们执行一次飞行任务后，会发生数百次变更。不是几个。数百个。如果你详细查看飞船、助推器和发动机，飞行之间可能有数千次变更。我只是在说硬件；软件变更更多。
English: Many are small, but a small change could be a big deal. The first issues you find are fundamental design flaws that would make success impossible. Some issues vary. They make success possible sometimes, but not every time. Maybe a design will blow up only once in a while. Things that work only sometimes can throw you off. Just because it worked once does not mean it will work again, because the combination of factors isn't the same. It requires a lot of flights to figure out which issues cause one in ten failures and which cause one in one hundred failures.
中文： 许多是小的，但小的变更可能是大事。你发现的第一个问题是基本设计缺陷，会使成功变得不可能。一些问题会变化。它们有时使成功成为可能，但不是每次。也许设计只会偶尔爆炸。只有时有时无的事情会让你迷失。仅仅因为它成功过一次并不意味着它会再次成功，因为因素的组合不一样。需要很多次飞行才能找出哪些问题导致十分之一的失败，哪些导致百分之一的失败。
English: You will lose. It will hurt the first fifty times. When you get used to losing, you will play each game with less emotion.
中文： 你会输。前五十次会很痛。当你习惯失败后，你会以更少的情绪玩每场游戏。
Simplicity Wins
简单获胜
English: Never use a cruise missile to kill a fly; just use a flyswatter.
中文： 永远不要用巡航导弹杀苍蝇；只用苍蝇拍。
English: Every decision we made in early SpaceX designs has been with simplicity in mind. Simplicity both improves reliability and reduces cost. Fewer components means fewer components to buy and fewer components that can go wrong.
中文： 我们在早期 SpaceX 设计中做出的每个决定都考虑到简单性。简单性既提高可靠性又降低成本。更少的部件意味着更少的部件需要购买，更少的部件可能出错。
English: The number of lines of code is not a figure of merit. I consider a large number of lines of code to be bad, not good. I would award one point for adding a line of code and two points for deleting a line of code.
中文： 代码行数不是优点的指标。我认为大量代码行是坏的，不是好的。我会为添加一行代码奖励一分，为删除一行代码奖励两分。
English: In general, always pick common sense as your guide. If following a "company rule" is obviously ridiculous in a particular situation, such that it would make for a great Dilbert cartoon, then the rule should change.
中文： 一般来说，总是选择常识作为你的指南。如果在特定情况下遵循"公司规则"显然很荒谬，以至于可以成为一幅伟大的迪尔伯特漫画，那么规则应该改变。
English: Simplicity is our mantra. It creates both reliability and low cost.
中文： 简单是我们的座右铭。它既创造可靠性又创造低成本。
English: Q: What are the benefits of simplicity at scale?
中文： 问：规模化的简单性有什么好处？
English: At Tesla, the Model 3 body线 in Fremont was only ever meant to make five thousand cars a week, and it's now doing seven thousand. We achieved that by removing things. We had been doing a lot of foolish things. We've changed some of the designs and made them simpler and easier to build. Simplicity comes from hundreds of little changes.
中文： 在特斯拉，弗里蒙特的 Model 3 车身线原本只计划每周生产五千辆车，现在达到七千辆。我们通过移除东西实现了这一点。我们一直做了很多愚蠢的事情。我们改变了一些设计，使它们更简单、更容易建造。简单来自数百个小改变。
English: Being able to get 40 percent more output from the same manufacturing line makes a big difference. It also reduces the marginal cost of production and improves the quality of the car. This is the result of a ton of hard work by a lot of people.
中文： 能够从同一条生产线获得 40% 更多的产出会产生巨大影响。它还降低了生产的边际成本并提高了汽车质量。这是很多人大量辛勤工作的结果。
English: For three months I was at the gigafactory trying to help fix battery production. It's a lot of little things. I look at every tiny part of each process and ask, "Is this process necessary?"
中文： 有三个月我在超级工厂试图帮助修复电池生产。这是很多小事情。我查看每个过程的每个微小部分并问，"这个过程必要吗？"
English: The best part is no part. The best process is no process.
中文： 最好的部件是没有部件。最好的过程是没有过程。
English: For example, a robot would put a car frame on a turntable. The turntable would rotate and then another robot would pick it up. The problem was the turntable would sometimes break down. So, we eliminated the turntable. With a robot-to-robot handoff, we had one less step, less equipment, and didn't have turntable breakage to consider. It's a lot of this really simple stuff, but a thousand times.
中文： 例如，机器人会将车架放在转盘上。转盘会旋转，然后另一个机器人会拿起它。问题是转盘有时会故障。所以，我们消除了转盘。通过机器人到机器人的交接，我们少了一步，少了设备，也不必考虑转盘故障。这是很多非常简单的东西，但重复一千次。
English: It's a lot of minimizing things that can go wrong and maximizing the efficiency of the simple things.
中文： 这是很多最小化可能出错的事情并最大化简单事情的效率。
English: If you've got a whole bunch of separate parts and each of them has a given tolerance—even if that tolerance is tight, like 0.2 millimeter tolerance—but if you've got fifty parts…you have to multiply the variances together. You'll end up with a huge variance between cars. That's one of the reasons it's better to combine parts rather than have more individual parts.
中文： 如果你有一大堆单独的部件，每个部件都有一定的公差——即使那个公差很紧，比如 0.2 毫米公差——但如果你有五十个部件……你必须将方差相乘。你最终会在汽车之间产生巨大的差异。这是最好合并部件而不是拥有更多单独部件的原因之一。
English: In the Model 3 engineering, there were a lot of right answers to the wrong questions.
中文： 在 Model 3 工程中，有很多对错误问题的正确答案。
English: Fifty different times for fifty different parts, an engineer would ask, "What's the best material to make this part out of?" Of course, they would get fifty different answers. They were all true individually, but not true collectively.
中文： 五十次针对五十个不同部件，工程师会问，"用什么材料制造这个部件最好？"当然，他们会得到五十个不同的答案。它们单独看都是真的，但集体看不是真的。
English: When you try to join all these parts made of dissimilar metals, there are many issues. You need better sealant to prevent galvanic corrosion. You've got to join some with rivets, some with spot welds, some with resin, or resin and spot welds. Then it looks like a Frankenstein situation all together.
中文： 当你试图连接所有这些由不同金属制成的部件时，有很多问题。你需要更好的密封剂来防止电偶腐蚀。你必须用铆钉连接一些，用点焊连接一些，用树脂连接一些，或树脂和点焊。然后它看起来像一个弗兰肯斯坦的情况。
English: It's way better to have a single piece, casted. Then you have no gaps, no sealant, no dissimilar metals. You can reduce the size of the body shop in the factory dramatically. Having the rear body cast for Model Y allowed us to reduce the body shop by 30 percent.
中文： 最好有一个单一的铸件。这样你就没有缝隙，没有密封剂，没有不同金属。你可以大幅减少工厂车身车间的规模。为 Model Y 铸造后车身使我们能够将车身车间减少 30%。
English: There's roughly a thousand robots on the Model 3 body line. Which, by the way, is not a figure of merit. We got rid of three hundred robots by switching to rear body casting. When we change the front body to casting, we'll get rid of another three hundred robots. You want fewer things, not more.
中文： Model 3 车身线上大约有一千个机器人。顺便说一句，这不是优点的指标。我们通过切换到后车身铸造摆脱了三百个机器人。当我们把前车身改为铸造时，我们将再摆脱三百个机器人。你想要更少的东西，而不是更多。
English: It's easy to say "simplify," but it's very difficult to do it.
中文： 说"简化"很容易，但做起来非常困难。
The Algorithm
算法
English: I became a broken record on The Algorithm. But it's helpful to say it to an annoying degree.
中文： 我对算法成了一个破唱片。但说到烦人的程度是有帮助的。
English: I have everyone at my companies rigorously implement a five-step process for engineering. I call it The Algorithm. I'll list the steps, then explain. The order is very important.
中文： 我让我公司的每个人都严格实施一个五步工程流程。我称之为算法。我会列出步骤，然后解释。顺序非常重要。
English: 1. Make your requirements less dumb. 2. Try very hard to delete the part or process. 3. Simplify or optimize. 4. Accelerate. 5. Automate.
中文： 1. 让你的要求不那么愚蠢。2. 非常努力地删除部件或过程。3. 简化或优化。4. 加速。5. 自动化。
English: Q: Why is the order of the steps so important?
中文： 问：为什么步骤的顺序如此重要？
English: I've personally made the mistake of going backward—on all five steps—multiple times. Many things at Tesla were automated, accelerated, simplified, and then deleted.
中文： 我个人曾犯过倒退的错误——在所有五个步骤上——多次。特斯拉的许多事情被自动化、加速、简化，然后被删除。
English: One example was fiberglass mats on top of the battery pack. At one point I was basically living on the battery pack production line, because it was choking the entire car's production. The first mistake was trying to fix the automation to make the robot better, to make it move faster on a shorter path. We increased the rate by 20 percent, then 100 percent. Then, we tried to optimize the use of glue and the drying speed.
中文： 一个例子是电池组顶部的玻璃纤维垫。有一段时间我基本上住在电池组生产线上，因为它扼住了整辆车的生产。第一个错误是试图修复自动化以使机器人更好，使它在更短的路径上移动更快。我们将速率提高了 20%，然后 100%。然后，我们试图优化胶水的使用和干燥速度。
English: Automating was a mistake, then accelerating was a mistake, then optimizing was a mistake. Finally, I asked the battery safety team, "What the hell are these mats for? Fire protection?" They said, "No, they're for noise and vibration."
中文： 自动化是个错误，然后加速是个错误，然后优化是个错误。最后，我问电池安全团队，"这些垫子到底是干什么的？防火吗？"他们说，"不，它们是用于噪音和振动的。"
English: I said, "But…you're the battery team." So I asked the noise vibration analysis team, "What's the mat for?" They said fire safety. It was like being in a Dilbert cartoon. I feel like I'm in a Dilbert cartoon quite frequently.
中文： 我说，"但……你们是电池团队。"所以我问噪音振动分析团队，"垫子是干什么的？"他们说防火安全。这就像在迪尔伯特漫画里一样。我觉得我经常在迪尔伯特漫画里。
English: So we ran a test: a car with and without the fiberglass mats and a microphone in both. No one could tell the difference. So, we deleted the part (the mats), which deleted a step that required two million dollars of robotics, because it was just a big pile of nonsense.
中文： 所以我们做了一个测试：一辆有玻璃纤维垫的车和一辆没有的车，两辆车都有麦克风。没人能分辨出区别。所以，我们删除了部件（垫子），这删除了一个需要两百万美元机器人的步骤，因为它只是一大堆废话。
English: Q: Can you walk me through the steps?
中文： 问：你能带我 walkthrough 这些步骤吗？
English: The first step is to question the requirements, and make your requirements less dumb. You have to start there, because otherwise you could get the perfect answer to the wrong question. This step makes the question the least wrong possible.
中文： 第一步是质疑要求，让你的要求不那么愚蠢。你必须从那里开始，否则你可能会得到对错误问题的完美答案。这一步使问题尽可能少错。
English: Your requirements are definitely dumb. It does not matter who gave them to you. Requirements from smart people are the most dangerous, because you're less likely to question them. Always question requirements, even if it came from me. Everyone is wrong some of the time.
中文： 你的要求肯定是愚蠢的。谁给你的不重要。来自聪明人的要求最危险，因为你不太可能质疑它们。总是质疑要求，即使它来自我。每个人都有错的时候。
English: Whatever requirements or constraints you do have must come from a person, not a department. You can't actually ask a department. You have to be able to ask a person, and the person putting forth the requirement must take responsibility for that requirement. Otherwise, you could have a requirement made up by an intern two years ago off the cuff, or someone who isn't even at the company anymore. You must know the name of the real person who made every requirement.
中文： 你无论有什么要求或约束都必须来自一个人，而不是一个部门。你不能真正问一个部门。你必须能够问一个人，提出要求的人必须对该要求负责。否则，你可能有一个两年前实习生随口编造的要求，或者一个甚至不在公司的人的要求。你必须知道提出每个要求的真实人物的姓名。
English: Many times we've had dumb requirements, dug into them, and discovered no one currently working in that department agrees with the requirement. These things are often way more silly than you think. So step one is make your requirements less dumb.
中文： 很多时候我们有愚蠢的要求，深入研究它们，发现目前在该部门工作没有人同意该要求。这些事情通常比你想象的更愚蠢。所以第一步是让你的要求不那么愚蠢。
English: Step two: Try very hard to delete the part or process. It sounds obvious, but people often forget to try deleting something entirely.
中文： 第二步：非常努力地删除部件或过程。这听起来很明显，但人们经常忘记尝试完全删除某些东西。
English: If you're not adding deleted things back in 10 percent of the time, you're clearly not deleting enough. Somewhat illogically, people often feel they've succeeded if they are not forced to put anything back in. But actually they have failed in a different way, because they've been overly conservative and have left things in there that shouldn't be.
中文： 如果你没有 10% 的时间把删除的东西加回来，你显然删除得不够。有些不合逻辑的是，人们经常觉得如果没有被迫把任何东西加回来就是成功了。但实际上他们以另一种方式失败了，因为他们过于保守，留下了不应该存在的东西。
English: The bias tends to be very strong for adding this part or process step "just in case we need it." But you can make "just in case" arguments for many, many, many things.
中文： 添加这个部件或过程步骤的偏见往往很强，"以防我们需要它"。但你可以为很多很多很多事情提出"以防万一"的论点。
English: People tend to remember, with sometimes a jarring level of pain, when they deleted something they later needed. They overcorrect, and put too much stuff in there, which overcomplicates things.
中文： 人们倾向于记住，有时带着令人震惊的痛苦程度，当他们删除了后来需要的东西时。他们过度纠正，放了太多东西在里面，这使事情过于复杂。
English: I tell them this in advance: "Look, we're deliberately going to delete more than we should. Some of the things we delete, we're going to put back in. At least one in ten things, we're going to add back in." People get a little shook by that. But if you're so conservative in deleting that you never have to put anything back in, you obviously have a lot of stuff that isn't needed. So, you've got to overcorrect for that tendency.
中文： 我提前告诉他们："看，我们故意要删除比我们应得的更多。我们删除的一些东西，我们会放回去。至少十分之一的东西，我们会加回来。"人们对此有点动摇。但如果你在删除方面如此保守以至于你从不必把任何东西放回去，你显然有很多不需要的东西。所以，你必须过度纠正这种倾向。
English: At SpaceX, I would tell the team, "We are on a deletion rampage!! Nothing is sacred. We will delete any remotely questionable tubes, sensors, manifolds, etc. tonight. Please go ultrahardcore on deletion and simplification." We put immense effort into reducing mass.
中文： 在 SpaceX，我会告诉团队，"我们处于删除狂潮中！！没有什么神圣的。今晚我们将删除任何稍微可疑的管道、传感器、歧管等。请在删除和简化方面超级硬核。"我们投入巨大努力减少质量。
English: There's a recursive factor to mass. If you add an extra ton of heat shielding, you also need more fuel to get it to orbit, and you need more fuel to deorbit, and you need more fuel to land it. Also the structure now has more load on it, because it's carrying an extra ton of heat shield. This applies to any given ton. Adding each ton is almost like adding two tons when it's fully considered. We've calculated it to be around a 1.8 recursion factor, but we're probably forgetting something that gets us closer to two. Every one ton of mass begets an extra ton. That is why it is very important to delete.
中文： 质量有一个递归因子。如果你增加一吨额外的隔热层，你也需要更多燃料将其送入轨道，你需要更多燃料使其脱离轨道，你需要更多燃料着陆。此外，结构现在有更多负荷，因为它承载了额外一吨的隔热层。这适用于任何给定的一吨。当充分考虑时，添加每一吨几乎就像添加两吨。我们计算它大约是 1.8 的递归因子，但我们可能忘记了一些让我们更接近二的东西。每一吨质量会产生额外一吨。这就是为什么删除非常重要。
English: Recapping so far: Step one, make your requirements less dumb. Step two, try hard to delete the part or process.
中文： 到目前为止回顾：第一步，让你的要求不那么愚蠢。第二步，努力删除部件或过程。
English: Then, once you have deleted as much as you can, the third step is to simplify or optimize. The third step. The third step. Not the first step. Why?
中文： 然后，一旦你尽可能删除了，第三步是简化或优化。第三步。第三步。不是第一步。为什么？
English: The most common mistake of smart engineers is to optimize a thing that should not exist.
中文： 聪明工程师最常见的错误是优化一个不应该存在的东西。
English: Everyone was trained in high school and college to answer the question in front of them. It's convergent logic. You can't tell the professor, "Your question is dumb." You have to answer the question. Without knowing it, almost everyone has this mental straightjacket on. They'll work on optimizing a thing that should simply not exist.
中文： 每个人在高中和大学都被训练回答面前的问题。这是收敛逻辑。你不能告诉教授，"你的问题很愚蠢。"你必须回答问题。不知不觉中，几乎每个人都有这个精神枷锁。他们会致力于优化一个根本不应该存在的东西。
English: Then, and only then, step four: accelerate cycle time. Once you're moving in the right direction, and moving efficiently…you're moving too slow. Go faster. You can always make things go faster.
中文： 然后，只有那时，第四步：加速周期时间。一旦你朝着正确的方向移动，并且高效地移动……你移动得太慢了。更快。你总是可以让事情变得更快。
English: But, do not go faster until you have worked on the other three things first. I mistakenly spent a lot of time accelerating processes that I later realized should have been deleted. Speeding up something that shouldn't exist is absurd. If you're digging your grave, don't dig it faster. Stop digging.
中文： 但是，在你先完成其他三件事之前不要更快。我错误地花了很多时间加速我后来意识到应该被删除的过程。加速不应该存在的东西是荒谬的。如果你在挖自己的坟墓，不要挖得更快。停止挖掘。
English: Step five, the final step, is to automate. The big mistake I made in the Tesla factories in Nevada and Fremont was trying to automate every step too early. To fix that, we had to tear hundreds of expensive robots out of the production line. We put a hole in the side of the building just to remove all that equipment.
中文： 第五步，最后一步，是自动化。我在内华达和弗里蒙特的特斯拉工厂犯的大错误是过早尝试自动化每个步骤。为了解决这个问题，我们不得不从生产线上拆掉数百个昂贵的机器人。我们在大楼侧面开了一个洞，只是为了移除所有那些设备。
English: Always wait until the end of designing a process—after you have questioned all the requirements and deleted unnecessary parts—before you introduce automation.
中文： 总是等到设计过程的最后——在你质疑了所有要求并删除了不必要的部件之后——再引入自动化。
MANIACAL URGENCY
疯狂紧迫感
English: A maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle.
中文： 疯狂的紧迫感是我们的运营原则。
Don't Waste Time
不要浪费时间
English: Excessive meetings are the blight of big companies and almost always get worse over time. Get rid of all large meetings, unless you're certain they are providing value to the whole audience, in which case, keep them short.
中文： 过多的会议是大公司的祸害，几乎总是随着时间的推移变得更糟。摆脱所有大型会议，除非你确定它们为整个受众提供价值，在这种情况下，保持它们简短。
English: Also get rid of frequent meetings, unless you are dealing with an extremely urgent matter. Meeting frequency should drop rapidly once the urgent matter is resolved.
中文： 还要摆脱频繁的会议，除非你正在处理极其紧急的事情。一旦紧急事项得到解决，会议频率应迅速下降。
English: Walk out of a meeting or drop off a call as soon as it is obvious you aren't adding value. It is not rude to leave; it is rude to make someone stay and waste their time.
中文： 一旦很明显你没有增加价值，就走出会议或挂断电话。离开不是粗鲁；让某人留下来浪费他们的时间才是粗鲁。
Speed Is Both Offense and Defense
速度既是进攻也是防守
English: The only true currency is time.
中文： 唯一真正的货币是时间。
English: The best offense and defense is speed. The SR-71 Blackbird is a military plane with almost no defense except acceleration. It was never shot down. Not even once. Over three thousand missiles were shot at the SR-71 Blackbird and none hit. All it did was go faster. The power of speed is underappreciated as a competitive factor.
中文： 最好的进攻和防守是速度。SR-71 黑鸟是一架军用飞机，除了加速外几乎没有防御。它从未被击落。一次也没有。超过三千枚导弹向 SR-71 黑鸟发射，没有一枚击中。它所做的只是更快。速度作为竞争因素的力量被低估了。
English: The real way you actually achieve intellectual property (IP) protection is by innovating fast. If your rate of innovation is high, then you don't need to worry about protecting the IP because other companies will be copying something you did years ago. That's fine. Just make sure your rate of innovation is fast. Speed of innovation is what matters.
中文： 你实际实现知识产权（IP）保护的真正方式是快速创新。如果你的创新率高，那么你不需要担心保护 IP，因为其他公司会复制你几年前做的事情。没关系。只要确保你的创新速度快。创新速度才是重要的。
English: We obviously cannot compete with the big car companies in size, so we must do so with intelligence and agility. A factory moving at twice the speed of another factory is basically equivalent to two factories. The company will succeed if it can do with one factory what takes other companies two, three, or four factories. We try to think, "How can we make each factory produce what would normally require five or even ten factories?"
中文： 我们显然不能在规模上与大汽车公司竞争，所以我们必须用智慧和敏捷性来竞争。以两倍于另一个工厂的速度移动的工厂基本上相当于两个工厂。如果公司能够用一个工厂完成其他公司需要两、三或四个工厂的事情，它就会成功。我们试图思考，"我们如何让每个工厂生产通常需要五个甚至十个工厂的东西？"
English: I have a running triage of what I do at each company, constantly thinking, "What is the most useful thing I could do?"
中文： 我对我在每家公司做的事情有一个持续的分诊，不断思考，"我能做的最有用的事情是什么？"
English: In early SpaceX, I told the team everything we did was a function of our burn rate. We were burning through a hundred thousand dollars per day. In the same way, I expected the revenue in ten years to be ten million dollars a day. Every day we were slower to achieve our goals was a day of missing out on that revenue.
中文： 在早期的 SpaceX，我告诉团队我们做的一切都是燃烧率的函数。我们每天燃烧十万美元。同样，我预计十年后的收入是每天一千万美元。我们每天越慢实现目标，就是错过那收入的一天。
English: You need to be a vector, not just a scalar. That means you need to go at high speed in the right direction. No company will always be going in the right direction all the time—so you have to do course corrections, like a guided missile.
中文： 你需要成为一个向量，而不仅仅是一个标量。这意味着你需要以高速向正确的方向前进。没有公司会一直朝着正确的方向前进——所以你必须进行航向修正，就像制导导弹一样。
English: I try to work as much as possible—to the edge of sanity. Every good hour or even minute of thinking about Tesla and SpaceX has such a big effect on the company. It makes sleeping difficult. Tesla is getting to the point where every high-quality minute of thinking has a million-dollar impact. That is insane. If Tesla is doing $2 billion a week in revenue, that's about $300 million a day, seven days a week. There are many instances where a half-hour meeting improved the company's financial outcome by $100 million.
中文： 我尽量尽可能多地工作——到理智的边缘。每一小时甚至每一分钟思考特斯拉和 SpaceX 对公司都有如此大的影响。这使得睡觉变得困难。特斯拉正达到每个高质量分钟的思考都有百万美元影响的地步。这太疯狂了。如果特斯拉每周收入 20 亿美元，那大约是每天 3 亿美元，一周七天。有很多例子表明，半小时的会议将公司的财务成果提高了 1 亿美元。
Do Things in Parallel
并行做事
English: Everything is measured in terms of time. What is the time risk associated with something? The one thing you cannot replace is time.
中文： 一切都用时间来衡量。与某事相关的时间风险是什么？你无法替代的一件事是时间。
English: For PayPal, we needed to establish a lot of back-office relationships to attach various data sources. The credit card system for processing credit cards, the Federal Reserve System for doing electronic funds transfers, the various fraud databases to run fraud checks. There was a lot we had to interface with, and it took a while to set all that up.
中文： 对于 PayPal，我们需要建立很多后台关系来连接各种数据源。处理信用卡的信用卡系统、进行电子资金转账的美联储系统、运行欺诈检查的各种欺诈数据库。我们有很多需要对接的，设置所有这些东西花了一些时间。
English: But by doing them all in parallel, it all came together simultaneously. Developing the software and having it ready for the general public coincided with us concluding deals with the outside vendors. All that took about a year.
中文： 但通过并行做所有这些事情，它们同时汇聚在一起。开发软件并准备好向公众发布与我们与外部供应商达成协议同时进行。所有这一切花了大约一年时间。
English: Avoid serialized dependencies. A lot of things have a "gestation period" and there is nothing you can do to accelerate it. If you can have all those things gestating in parallel, that will substantially accelerate your overall timeline. People tend to serialize too much. Put as many gestating elements in parallel as possible.
中文： 避免序列化依赖。很多事情都有"孕育期"，你无法加速它。如果你能让所有这些事情并行孕育，这将大大加速你的整体时间表。人们倾向于过多地序列化。尽可能多地将孕育元素并行放置。
English: If a timeline is long, it's wrong.
中文： 如果时间表很长，那就是错的。
Break Down the "Impossible"
分解"不可能"
English: The general principles of first-principle thinking apply to software, hardware, anything really. Often, we were told something was impossible, but once we broke it down into its constituent elements, we could solve those.
中文： 第一性原理思维的一般原则适用于软件、硬件，任何事物。通常，我们被告知某事是不可能的，但一旦我们将其分解为其组成元素，我们就能解决这些问题。
English: For xAI in 2024, we were trying to build a training supercluster (a giant network of computers to train an AI model). We went to the various suppliers and said we needed one hundred thousand H100s (superpowerful computer chips) to be able to train coherently. Their estimates for how long it would take to complete that were eighteen to twenty-four months. Well, we needed to get that done in six months or we wouldn't be competitive.
中文： 对于 2024 年的 xAI，我们试图建立一个训练超级集群（一个巨大的计算机网络来训练 AI 模型）。我们去找各种供应商，说我们需要十万个 H100（超级强大的计算机芯片）才能进行连贯训练。他们对完成这件事需要多长时间的估计是十八到二十四个月。好吧，我们需要在六个月内完成，否则我们就没有竞争力。
English: So, we broke that down. We need a building; we need power; we need cooling.
中文： 所以，我们分解了它。我们需要一栋建筑；我们需要电力；我们需要冷却。
English: We didn't have enough time to build a building from scratch. So, we found a factory in Memphis that was no longer in use. The input power was 15 megawatts and we needed 150 megawatts. So, we rented generators and put them along one side of the building.
中文： 我们没有足够的时间从头开始建造一栋建筑。所以，我们在孟菲斯找到了一家不再使用的工厂。输入功率是 15 兆瓦，我们需要 150 兆瓦。所以，我们租用了发电机，把它们放在大楼的一侧。
English: Then, we needed cooling. So, we rented about a quarter of the mobile cooling capacity of the US and put the chillers on the other side of the building.
中文： 然后，我们需要冷却。所以，我们租用了美国大约四分之一的移动冷却能力，把冷却器放在大楼的另一侧。
English: That didn't fully solve the problem because the power variations during training are very big. Power can drop by 50 percent in 100 milliseconds, which the generators can't keep up with. So then we added Tesla megapacks and modified the software in the megapacks to be able to smooth out the power variation during the training run.
中文： 这并没有完全解决问题，因为训练期间的功率变化非常大。功率可以在 100 毫秒内下降 50%，发电机跟不上。所以我们添加了特斯拉 Megapack，并修改了 Megapack 中的软件，以便能够在训练运行期间平滑功率变化。
English: Then there were a bunch of networking challenges. Networking cables for one hundred thousand GPUs (graphics processing units) are very, very difficult. We ran the networking team to do the cabling in four shifts, 24/7. I was sleeping in the data center and doing cabling myself.
中文： 然后有一堆网络挑战。十万个 GPU（图形处理单元）的网络电缆非常非常困难。我们让网络团队分四班，24/7 进行布线。我睡在数据中心，自己布线。
English: Now called Colossus, it is currently the largest AI training platform in the world. It was constructed in 122 days. Ninety-two days later, it had been doubled to two hundred thousand GPUs.
中文： 现在称为 Colossus，它是目前世界上最大的 AI 训练平台。它在 122 天内建成。92 天后，它已经翻倍到二十万个 GPU。
Set Aggressive Timelines
设定激进的时间表
English: I often tell the Tesla team: "It's okay to scrap equipment or money. It's not okay to scrap time."
中文： 我经常告诉特斯拉团队："报废设备或金钱是可以的。报废时间是不可以的。"
English: When I was interviewing for a vice president of machining, I explained I was paying for everything at SpaceX out of pocket. I asked him, "What's the cheapest you would work for?" He haggled, and eventually we agreed. Ten minutes later, I gave him a contract. This was a Saturday at 5:00 p.m. He started working that night.
中文： 当我面试加工副总裁时，我解释我在 SpaceX 自掏腰包支付一切。我问他，"你愿意为多少最低薪酬工作？"他讨价还价，最终我们达成了协议。十分钟后，我给了他一份合同。那是一个星期六下午 5 点。他当晚就开始工作了。
English: Q: Do you deliberately make aggressive prediction timelines to drive people to be ambitious?
中文： 问：你故意制定激进的预测时间表来推动人们雄心勃勃吗？
English: For internal timelines, we set the most aggressive timelines we can. I do this because there's a kind of "law of gaseous expansion" for schedules. Whatever time you set, it's not going to be less than that. It's rare that something will ever get done faster than the schedule.
中文： 对于内部时间表，我们设定我们能设定的最激进的时间表。我这样做是因为时间表有一种"气体膨胀定律"。无论你设定什么时间，都不会少于那个时间。很少有事情会比时间表更快完成。
English: When I cite a schedule, it is actually the schedule I think is true. It's not some fake schedule I made up. It may be delusional—that is entirely possible, and that has happened from time to time. But it's never some knowingly fake deadline, ever.
中文： 当我引用一个时间表时，它实际上是我认为真实的时间表。这不是我编造的假时间表。它可能是妄想的——这完全可能，而且时不时发生过。但它从来不是明知故犯的假截止日期，从来没有。
English: I want to emphasize that some dates are not dates that will actually be met. For example, the initial release date for the Model 3 at Tesla was an impossible date because there are seven thousand unique components in the Model 3, and our deadline assumed all of them would arrive on time. That won't happen. But, it was a date for us to hold ourselves (internally) and our suppliers to.
中文： 我想强调，有些日期不是实际会实现的日期。例如，特斯拉 Model 3 的初始发布日期是一个不可能的日期，因为 Model 3 有七千个独特组件，我们的截止日期假设它们都能按时到达。那不会发生。但是，那是我们用来约束自己（内部）和供应商的日期。
English: I do have a habit of being optimistic with schedules.
中文： 我确实有对时间表乐观的习惯。
English: When I give estimates about our production, it's guesswork. Especially guesses about exponential curves. In exponential growth, the difference a year or two makes to an outcome is enormous. We got a lot of criticism for the number of cars we delivered in 2017. The area under the curve of production in 2017 was quite small because it was the beginning of an exponential ramp, but once that growth got going, the area under the curve was enormous. That's why people were so shocked. I kept trying to say this, but people don't understand what exponential means.
中文： 当我给出关于我们产量的估计时，那是猜测。尤其是关于指数曲线的猜测。在指数增长中，一两年对结果的差异是巨大的。我们因 2017 年交付的汽车数量而受到很多批评。2017 年生产曲线下的面积相当小，因为它是指数增长的开始，但一旦增长开始，曲线下的面积是巨大的。这就是为什么人们如此震惊。我一直试图这样说，但人们不理解指数是什么意思。
English: In 2018, we doubled our global fleet, cumulatively. We made and delivered about as many cars as we had in our entire history. Most people thought it wasn't possible. If you predicted linear growth, it wouldn't seem possible.
中文： 2018 年，我们的全球车队累计翻了一番。我们制造和交付的汽车数量与我们整个历史中的数量差不多。大多数人认为这是不可能的。如果你预测线性增长，它似乎不可能。
English: But when making estimates involving exponential growth, small changes in the calendar breakpoint have enormous percentage differences in outcome. The time difference is small, but the percentage difference in the outcome is enormous.
中文： 但在进行涉及指数增长的估计时，日历断点的小变化会导致结果的巨大百分比差异。时间差异很小，但结果的百分比差异巨大。
English: As far as our predictions are concerned, the media tends to report all the wrong ones and ignore all the correct ones. I've had a long career in multiple industries. If you list just my sins, I sound like the worst person on Earth. But if you put those in the context of what I've done right, it makes much more sense.
中文： 就我们的预测而言，媒体倾向于报道所有错误的预测，忽略所有正确的预测。我在多个行业有很长的职业生涯。如果你只列出我的罪过，我听起来像地球上最糟糕的人。但如果你把这些放在我做对的事情的背景下，这就更有意义了。
English: I don't want to blow your mind, but I'm not always right.
中文： 我不想让你震惊，但我并不总是对的。
English: The longer you do anything, the more mistakes you will make, cumulatively. If you sum up just the mistakes, it sounds like I'm the worst predictor ever, which is not the case.
中文： 你做任何事情的时间越长，你犯的错误就越多，累积起来。如果你只总结错误，听起来我是有史以来最糟糕的预测者，事实并非如此。
English: Some of them happen sooner or later, but they do tend to come true. It's rare they do not come true eventually. For radical technology predictions, the point is not that it was a few years late, but that it happened at all. That's the more important part.
中文： 其中一些迟早会发生，但它们确实倾向于实现。它们最终不实现的情况很少见。对于激进的技术预测，重点不是它晚了几 年，而是它确实发生了。那是更重要的部分。
English: I may be a little optimistic, but I always deliver.
中文： 我可能有点乐观，但我总是兑现承诺。
WE MUST MAKE STUFF
我们必须制造东西
English: Manufacturing is underrated. It's hard.
中文： 制造被低估了。它很难。