The two billionaires, who co-founded PayPal, don’t have the same approach when it comes to the mindset that can lead to success.
Both are billionaires and teachers from Silicon Valley.
They both lived in South Africa. One was born there while the other came there as a child.
They worked together for many years, but have a love-hate relationship. Some say they are polar opposites.
The first is Elon Musk and the second is Peter Thiel.
The two billionaires merged their respective companies in the 2000s to create a major financial services group. Musk co-created X.com, an online bank, and Thiel co-founded Confinity Inc, a software company that developed an easy payment system. In March 2000, PayPal was created and Musk was named CEO.
Pessimism
But the relationship turned extremely sour when Thiel, according to Max Chafkin’s 2021 biography ‘The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley’s Pursuit of Power,’ masterminded a coup to oust Musk, when the Tesla CEO was on his moon. of honey.
The episode left wounds in their relationship that have not yet fully healed. Summing up the two men, Chafkin wrote: “While Thiel could be comically reserved, even among close friends, Musk was incapable of self-censorship.” He continued: “While Thiel tended to think in terms of limiting risk, Musk was perpetually going all out.”
As it turns out, the two former tech brothers also differ in the mindset required to succeed in life. This is what Musk just suggested in the context of a comment to a message posted on Twitter by a user. The user described the importance Thiel places on one’s confidence to get things done. He provided two quotes from Thiel on the subject.
“If you think you’re going to win, it doesn’t mean you’re going to win. If you think you’re going to lose, you’re going to lose,” Thiel reportedly said. to get an A on the exam, you won’t always get an A+. If you think you’ll get an F, you’ll always get an F.”
Basically, Thiel seems to believe that if you don’t believe in success, failure becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you expect to fail, you will fail. It is the opposite when you believe that you can achieve something. The fact that you believe in your goal will push you to push yourself and get a better result.
SpaceX, Tesla
Musk seems to strongly disagree. For the CEO of Tesla (TSLA) – Get a free report, success can sometimes seem very unlikely, but at the same time, we can still work hard and put all our energy into doing our best. Being realistic about the chance of success doesn’t necessarily predetermine the end result and doesn’t always set us on a path to failure, Musk says.
To back up his point, he draws on his own experience with Tesla and SpaceX, the two companies he co-founded and founded respectively. He says that he thought he had very little chance of success.
“I thought both SpaceX and Tesla had a less than 10% chance of success,” Musk responded.
Created in 2003, Tesla has become the world leader in electric vehicles and has a market value of $613 billion as of this writing. The Austin, Texas-based automaker made more money last year than legacy automakers General Motors (GM) – Get a free reportand ford (F) – Get a free reportset.
As for SpaceX, the company is about to launch its first flight to orbit the Earth. It is valued at around $137 billion.
Ironically, Thiel had invested $20 million in SpaceX when the company was in trouble in 2008. That money helped keep SpaceX afloat. The rocket and satellite company said in mid-March that it is almost ready for the first orbital test flight of the Starship, the rocket with which Musk wants to conquer Mars.
