Comments by "James DellaNeve" (@jamesdellaneve9005) on "Twitter Submits to Elon" video.

I live in SoCal and work in aerospace. When you interview for Spacex, they tell you that 70 hours is the normal work week. I have 2 years of career left, but if I was 25 years old, it would be a great season of life to cut your teeth on. I worked 70 hours per week for 2 years straight on the C17 cargo jet. It’s hard getting initial products to launch, but it’s a great experience that stays with you for life. Layoff the Twitter layabouts. Find people with fire in their bellies for their customers.
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@thefool3424 It’s a sacrifice for sure. But you don’t get to the moon and back without complete buyin of tens of thousands of people. This isn’t for DMV employees. There’s an esprit decor required to do monumental things. Then you launch and things get back to more normal. Spacex hired old timers to get started, but it still took them a decade before having success. I love what they are doing and Elon over promised and missed deadlines and such, but they’ve really got it going. The results are there. Silicon Valley giants are in their second generation. The innovative people who got them there have moved on and you have hoards of layabouts left behind. This can be fixed through layoffs and firings.
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@linusgustafsson2629 LOL! I don’t use Twitter or Facebook. The world would be a better place without these. The world doesnt need them.
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@thefool3424 When you are on critical projects like this, there’s no sitting around wasting time doing non important things. This isnt a Japanese corporation where it’s a contest on who’s leaving work last. These projects go 7-24. Three shifts until launch. By the time that you are ready to launch, everyone’s exhausted and the launch becomes a big party. On our launch, the employees barbqued in the parking lot next to the runway. We did this for two full days due to delays and it lifted off with 30 minutes to spare in the flight window. Watch the Spacex launch where they put the Tesla in orbit. Listen to the employees cheering and hooting and hollering. Everyone’s invested. We are lucky to work in an industry where our products actually change the world.
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@thefool3424 BTW, these people are not all work and no play either. Here’s a list of things some of them do in their spare time. Flying organs to organ donors, winning the national high school robotics competition, holder of the world record for paper airplane time aloft, three times in the wheelchair Olympics, writing books, drag boat racing, running their own wineries, etc. I know each of these people. They have full lives. Yes, maybe doing more and are busier than many. Personally, I’ve been an adjunct professor for a decade, designed and built my own house, wrote a book and am building a race car. This is typical among my peers. Just slowing down now. I want to do more European travel.
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@fraxonthefurry21 They’ve already launched their new products. They are in maintenance and enhancement mode. It should be normal now.
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@varnishvarnish If you like your iPhone, GPS system, weather satellites, all things Silicon Valley, etc. This is how it was done. People gladly joined and believed in the mission. Others should be cubicle monkeys and work at the DMV or censure people that they don’t like on Facebook.
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@varnishvarnish These work environments happen on new development programs. Once you fly, it goes into maintenance mode and enhancement mode. All of them are like this because it’s required to get new products over the fence. Facebook’s founding technologists have moved on and the layabouts are maintaining it. Nothing new is happening, except for censorship or other non value added activities. New development and certification is the hard part. Those people move to other new projects, the middle performers are important. They stay behind and keep it going for the next twenty years. I’ve been in this industry for 35 years. The entrepreneurs and innovators know each other across companies and often move between the firms. Elon has a house on SpaceX property. Our new product program managers live within a mile or two of the plant. You have to. It’s not for everyone, but you don’t get great new world changing products without this commitment. People who cut their teeth doing these programs become the leaders and executives and chief technologists of the future. Why? They have a track record of achievement and are in demand. The opportunities create themselves. These are the corporate special operators.
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@KratostheThird Elon will demand excellence. He will fire those sitting around tweeting and kvetching about those that they disagree with.
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