Surround Yourself With Great People

A Company is a group of people working together to create a product or service.

In his commencement speech at USC Elon Musk explained that if you are creating or joining a company the most important thing is to attract great people.

“Join a group that is amazing that you really respect or if you are building a company you’ve got to gather great people.”

For a company to be great it must be made up of great people.

With Tesla Elon says a College degree – or even high school – is not needed.

What is needed is a track record of exceptional results.  Elon is smart enough to know exceptional people do not always have college degrees.

In the past I started and grew an inspirational quotes website until we were acquired…

The most enduring and persistent quote that continually resurfaced was from Jim Rohn:

“You’re the average of the five people spend the most time with.”

Or in other words: You are the company you keep.

So keep great company.

Surround yourself with great people.

And give the hard working people on your teams credit when credit is due.  

In conversation with Bill Gates Elon said: 

“Most of the time – I get way too much credit or attention for what I do.  I’m just the visible element.  But the reason those companies are successful is because we have extremely talented people at all levels that are making it happen.”

Gotta love Elon’s humility.

Because of Elon’s willingness to share the credit undoubtedly his employees are willing to work harder than if Elon selfishly claimed the success was all him – even though it’s clear Elon and his involvement is a massively positive vector for success.

Elon’s powerful friends and terrific teams helped make it happen.