Subject:

MSP 601: Fundamental of Project Management

Assignment:

Project Manager Interview &

Leadership Style of Elon Musk

Presented to:

Mr.Shehzad Ahmad

Prepared By:

Contents

1: Interview of Project Manager………………………………………………

Question 1 …………………………………………………………………………3

Question 2 ………………………………………………………………………....3

Question 3 …………………………………………………………………………3

Question 4 …………………………………………………………………………4

Question 5 …………………………………………………………………………5

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Question 6 …………………………………………………………………………7

Question 7 …………………………………………………………………………8

Question 8 …………………………………………………………………………8

Question 9 …………………………………………………………………………9

Question 10 ……………………………………………………………………….10

2: Leadership Styles…………………………………………………………….11

QUESTION NO 1:

How did you get into project management?

I did not get into project management pursue. I have been doing marketing from

Eighteen years. My expertise was strategically in development of KPIs (key

performance indicators) and development of operational standards and I get all these

expertise by working in different organization in different countries working with brands

products and logistics all the way education, marketing, hospitality and food. So, I have

the opportunity to understand how the product and people operate at highest level so I

get into project management and I think it happened by default.

QUESTION NO 2:

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IF you had to rate the job of project management on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being

the highest, how would you rate it?

Rating depend on the what highest means. This is very stressful job on the other hand it

is highest satisfaction job. From the perspective of satisfaction I would like to rate this

job on 9 or 9.5.

QUESTION NO 3:

Briefly explain the reason for your rating. What do you enjoy most? And what do

you like least about being a project manager?

Managing situation, managing people trying to bring people together for shed sense of

ownership something that you know no body born into your acquire with experience and

then you realize that trying to incurred the share of shed ownership with different

stakeholders it’s very important to the success of a company you cannot just come up

with the idea to force other people to like your idea you have to be able to shared that

idea that value with different stakeholders and make them believe in the idea as well, so

that the idea is suddenly, even if you come up with the great idea you to sacrifice to say

that this no longer my idea it is the idea of us or our group then you take the back seat,

you know no longer used to such as I you have to use such as We, Of how the

company can benefit so we have to be , when you trend a manager project you have to

be the silent operator , you have to encourage leadership, So from that point of view

Why I say 9 and 9.5 over 10 it because of something I am good , Why 15 out of 10 for

stress is because trying to bring the best out of every one is very stress full position, it’s

also to take care of your stakeholders to make them feel important , to make sure the

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deep feel your voice is her , to make sure that they understand why? Why you disagree

with them and to take the extra effort to be able to soften, you can easily say sorry this

is not the way that it should be done or you can say that what is the alternative, it’s a

question of having the right language skills, the right body language, the right aptitude,

the right humility and sometimes you just have to accept that the bigger picture is the

most important thing So managing Egos, managing deadlines, managing how people

comfort to them is highly stressful.

QUESTION NO 4:

Did you have any training or special talents or experiences that qualified you to

be a project manager? Are you certified or have you thought about becoming

certified as a PMP®?

No, none special talents, I guess again I think it comes from experience we are sum

total of the mistakes that we make and you know I think to every great story there is a

history of thousand failures, so you must be willing to accept failure you must be willing

to learn from failures and then try to share the experiences, So yes I understand at their

many parts in my life I did think that I should go and do the PMP cost is just somehow

it’s never come about But for sure one day I would like to do.

QUESTION NO 5

What do you feel is the most important thing you do as a project manager? On

what task do you spend the most time each day?

I feel’ I think the most important thing as a project manager to bringing together people

and ideas and setting with them to share goals and responsibility you know creating

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value, I mean just a lot of project managers says this is your project pipe-line, this is

when you have to deliver this, this is when he has to deliver this and all of us come

together is does not always work, I mean in any environment you have to challenge

mind sets and you must always be willing to challenge your own mind set as well, If the

day you start believing that As a project director you are absolutely right about

everything is the day where you actually wrong about everything because you must

have an open mind as a project director you must be willing to understand every body’s

issue and you must help them find a solution to over cum those issues, So I think it’s the

most important thing as a project director is bringing together people and ideas and

finding a way to help people to solve issues to simplify matters for then rather than

complicate matters for them. I think as a project director you have over all vision the

point starting any project, your boss, your owner or your stakeholder, your board has

giving you these are our objectives we required you to fulfill these objectives then ones

those objectives are sets, you understands these are the benchmarks you need to

reach those bench marks as a goal and then long the way start your journey, then

journey becomes one of discovery, Discovery of what the actual situation is under

ground, discovery of the gapes that we have to reach the vision that is set by the

company and a discovery of the people that you have to come along the vision, the

whole idea of having a team is that, if you don’t take feed back of your team there’s no

point having query right. Everybody wants to be their ideas to be here, everybody wants

to feel important, This is the most basic human ins thing or basic human value that we

have themselves, perhaps that we all want a feel important, some of us you know work

harder than others, some of us work less harder than others but inherently for verity of

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reasons, somebody could be in the company for 20years , somebody could be in the

company for the 2 months , I think each if we learn how to accept people point of view

because the person is been the company for 2 months can see something that the

person who has been in the company for 20 years cannot see , is when you been in the

place you stay too long you have a sudden style of doing something’s , most people feel

finding uncomfortable to go out of their comfort zone to change how can thing can

operate, So having the right Team , is a mixture of having acquiring , gaining the right

knowledge right experience that you want form stakeholders and also using the youthful

energy that fresh new comers have , who to accomplish something , who want to

change something, who want to do something , So ayah the point of being a project

director I spend a quality of time to direct the team, direct the set of ideas Y’s.

QUESTION NO 6:

What are some of the opportunities and risks you have encountered on projects?

Please describe any notable successes and failures and what you have learned

from them?

I think whenever I have been given the project that opportunity that I get from the project

is to create more than what my goals are right, and in the same token the risk that you

get from the projects some times by trying to achieve more sometimes risk the initial

goal from being the accomplish right so, the same perfection that you chase is an

opportunity but if not managed well can also become a risk, so I think on daily basis you

have to manage you know aspersion with capacity, you can either pull people to words

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the direction you want them to go or you can go behind to push them to words the

direction that want to go ,So pushing and pulling you have to do at various stages in

your professional roam by pulling sometimes you know you have to lead , by pushing

sometimes you have aspire your stakeholders, your colleagues to do their part to lead

the world, the opportunity is a wonderful , the opportunity is creating things that nobody

ever talk to create before setting the bench marks and products, In customer services

sometimes the most basic thing sometimes the most simple thing that can be defined

success is when to participate to understand each other better, to participate to respect

each other more and when there is more respect ,when there is more understanding of

how each department, each person has pivotal role to play in any company success

across all departments across all people , I think that’s one of the great opportunity of

project management that is to bring people together. I think I fail and I succeed every

day I think I make mistakes and I do great things every day and that’s because I am

willing to challenge you know, knock the door people open and sometimes we knock on

door people don’t but I think one thing I learned most, I think the best success I have

and the success that I had is because of I had learned from my failures that if you don’t

knock no one can opens door, I think as a project director you to be able to knock on

ideas, knock on will, knock on mind sets.

QUESTION NO 7:

What are some of the tools, software or otherwise, that you use, and there is a

whole bunch of soft wear which is very important but the scope of work I am

doing right know yes’ I set time lines I set pipe-lines currently I don’t use any

tools however PMP tools are essentially but there’s lot of applications lot of tools

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in the market, even what’s app can be great management tool, I guess as we

progress toward the use of better technology. What is your opinion of those

tools?

I don’t have be able to give a good answer on that ‘I think for project management

software

QUESTION NO 8:

What are some steps a project manager can take to improve the effectiveness

and efficiency of a team? How does a new project manager gain the respect and

loyalty of team members? Can you share any examples of situation you faced

related to this topic?

A project manager can chase efficiency by managing projects as quickly as possible but

sometimes we lose connection that we need to have as human being to share

appreciation. The effective communication can make project team effective and

efficient. Just because I can speak well it does not mean I am better than all, other team

member can possibly have better idea to rely too. Sometimes understanding works like

a tool to understand his or her skill sets. Having good instance is a good tool that we

need to have an effective and efficient team. You should use your mouth to say right

thing at right time by using mind in right direction by using your managerial skills. The

most important way to gain respect and loyalty is by the truth. You have to recognize the

truth. As a project manager you are a conductor. All of your team play instrument in their

own way and you need to give respect to take respect. You need to help your team to

highlight their strengths and you need constantly to appreciate that this team member

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has this fantastic strength on the other hand a bad project manager always talk on the

weaknesses of team. As a good project manager you need to overcome these

weaknesses and become the missing part of the team. I as a project manager daily

overcome the fear of people that what they are doing could be wrong. I think on daily

basis managing doubts of the people is the duty of project manager. Project manager is

the person who is managing the end line in different people to get them in way the

company needs them to be to achieve its goals.

QUESTION NO 9:

What suggestions do you have for working with sponsors and senior managers?

Can you share any examples of situation you faced related to this topic?

You have to make them feel important and make sure they understand why you are

disagree with them. You can easily sorry this is not the way in which it should be done

and this is the alternate way. Sometimes a project manager does not have right

language skills, right body language and right attitude and sometimes you just have to

take the picture from stakeholders perspective, you should manage egos, managing

deadlines and managing how people conform to them its highly stressful.

QUESTION NO 10:

Do you have any suggestion for future project managers, such as any specific

preparations they should make, skills they should learn, etc.?

My suggestion is one should take PMP course, I think it’s very helpful besides it’s not

just a piece of paper that you should want to have but I think getting inside case studies

and how people work on projects but if you don’t have ability to listen, if you don’t have

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the ability to connect with people on mental and emotional level than project

management is not good job for you. Project management is the ability to understand

the processes and the people that make up these processes. We should not hide

behind processes because processes were not created to define men, men defines

processes. So process should be meant that allowance for innovation also maintains a

system. A system is the most important thing because in an organization it’s all about a

system.

Part B: Research on the leadership styles of Mr. Elon Musk

Elon Musk was born in Pretoria, South Africa on 28th June, 1971.

In 1983, when he was 12, Musk sold a game called "Blastar" to a computer magazine

for 500$. Musk defined it as "a trivial game …. But better than Flappy Bird."

Musk's school days were not easy — he was hospitalized once after being crushed by

bulls. The bulls threw Musk down from stairs and beat him till he blacked out, Ashlee

Vance says in his book "Elon Musk: SpaceX, Tesla and the Quest for a Fantastic

Future."

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After high school graduation, Musk relocated to Canada and spent two years for

studying at Queen's University in Kingston. He moved to Canada with his mother Maye,

his brother Kimbal and his sister Tosca. But he finished his education at the University

of Pennsylvania, taking degrees in physics and economics from home.

While learning from the University of Pennsylvania, Musk and a class fellow rented out

a 10-bedroom house and turned that house into a nightclub. The change, which Musk

take on with Adeo, was one of his first risk-taking experiments.

After his graduation, Musk moved to Stanford University to study for his PhD. But he

hardly started this program before leaving it. He postponed his admission after only two

days in California and deciding to check his luck in the dot-com boom that was just get

happening. He never go back to finish his education at Stanford.

With his younger brother, Kimbal, he launched Zip2. Their father gave them $28,000 to

start their own website, which provides city travel guides to the newspapers like the

New York Times and Chicago Tribune. Whereas Zip2 got off the ground, Musk exactly

lived in the office and dropped at a local YMCA. The effort productive when Compaq

bought Zip2 in a deal worth $341 million in cash and stock, earning Musk $22 million.

Musk next started X.com, an online banking company. He lofted the company in 1999

using $10 million which he got from the Zip2 sale. One year later, X.com submerge with

Confinity, a financial startup cofounded by Peter Thiel, to form PayPal. Musk was

named the CEO of the newly invent PayPal. But it wouldn't continue. In October 2000,

he started a big fight among the PayPal co-founders by presuming for them to shift their

servers from the free UNIX operating system to Microsoft Windows. PayPal CTO Max

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Levchin pushed back, hard. While Musk was make journey to Australia for a much-

needed vacation, PayPal's board fired him and made Thiel the new CEO. "That's the

issue with them," Musk told years later about his misfortunate trip in late 2000.

But things start worked out for Musk — he made another windfall when eBay bought

PayPal in late 2002. As PayPal's individual shareholder, he interwoven $165 million of

the $1.5 billion price eBay paid.

Even before the PayPal sale, Musk was imagined his next move, including a crazy plan

to send mice or plants to Mars. A lifelong ventilator of science fiction, Musk even tried to

buy demilitarize Soviet missiles for the purpose. But the Russian sellers demand 8

million Dollars for every dead missile, and Musk thought he could build his own for with

less cost.

In early 2002, Musk started the company that would be known as Space Exploration

Technologies, or SpaceX. Musk's aim was to make spaceflight competitive by a factor of

ten. SpaceX's first vehicles were named with Star Wars'. They were the Falcon 1 and 9.

A vehicle was named after the famous song. The name of the spacecraft, the Dragon,

was Musk's push at skeptics who told him SpaceX would never be able to put vehicles

into space.

SpaceX's future goal is to make colonizing Mars economical. SpaceX won't file for a

basic public expiation until what Musk calls the "Mars Colonial Transporter" is flying

regularly, he said.

Musk has also been keeping busy with another milestone, particularly with Tesla

Motors. Musk made the first of what would be $70 million of total endowment in Tesla, a

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car electric company co-founded by startup exec Martin Eberhard. Musk took a major

product act at Tesla, helping develop its first car, the Roadster. The first all-electric

Roadster begun in 2006, when Musk was providing as Tesla's chairman. He's now its

CEO also.

As if that wasn't decent, Musk came up with the idea for Solar City, a solar energy

company. Musk gave his cousins Peter and Lyndon Rive the working money to get

Solar City off the ground in 2006.

But back at Tesla, all was not going good. With Eberhard as CEO, Tesla was spending

way more money than it was taking in. In 2007, Musk open a boardroom coup, first

ousting Eberhard from his CEO seat and executive suites entirely. In 2008, with the

economic trouble seriously delimitate his options, Musk privately released Tesla from

exhaustion. Musk devoted $40 million into Tesla Company and loaned the company $40

million more. Not simultaneously, Then he was named the CEO of Tesla the same year.

But between SpaceX, Tesla, and Solar City, Musk very closely go bankrupt. He

describes that 2008 as the bad year of his life. Tesla start losing money, and SpaceX

was having trouble launching its Falcon 1 rocket. By 2009, Musk was victimized

personal loans just to sustain.

Same year, Musk relationship with his wife was not going good. Musk had six sons.

But nearly around Christmas 2008, things going good again. Musk getting good news

SpaceX touch down a $1.5 billion contract with NASA to convey goods into space, and

Tesla finally catch up more investors for their company. In 2010, things had suddenly

change around, with Tesla claiming fruitful initial public expiation. Tesla got 226 million

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dollars in the IPO, becoming the first car company to go public after the Forf. To get his

budget back on record, Musk sold shares worth $15 million in the expiation.

Musk's remarkable life was starting to get observed in other fields, too, most highly in

Hollywood movies. Like in Robert Downey the "Iron Man" movies is at least moderately

focused on Musk.

All the while, Musk's personal life has been in persistent alteration. Musk started dating

actress Tallulah Riley in 2008. They got married in 2010 and separated in 2012. They

remarried. In December 2014, Musk filed for a divorce but depart the paperwork. Riley

filed for divorce in March 2018; that divorce was decided in October 2018.

All is going well, though, especially at SpaceX. At the end of 2015, SpaceX had made

24 launches on appointment like more supplying the International Space Station, setting

lots of records along the way. The SpaceX Falcon 9 made the successful water landing

as an orbital rocket.

Musk can't stop. He had come up with new thoughts. Among his new is the Hyperloop.

A super speed train that travels in a vacuum tube, the Hyperloop could theoretically

transport passengers from Los Angeles to San Francisco in 30 minutes. Musk is

allowing other stakeholder build their own styles.

Musk also recently started another startup — The Boring Company, which is more

interesting than its name suggests. Launched last year, the Boring Company's mission

is to give a structure of tunnels under and around cities for high-speed, no-traffic driving.

Musk has said he's discussed with the White House the idea of constructing a tunnel

between New York and Washington D.C. that could be used for a Hyperloop.

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Musk co-founded OpenAI, in 2015 a nonprofit dedicated to researching artificial

intelligence and assure it doesn't destroy humanity. Musk has communicate interest that

the race for better AI could end up sparking a third world war.

At the same time that he's rear interests’ bout AI, Musk is promoting Tesla's self-driving

car capabilities. Tesla introduce autopilot system is available on all three of its models,

including the new Model 3, a lower-cost car launched earlier this year that brings the

company closer to its targets of making electric vehicles reachable for the public. Last

year, Tesla bought solar dCity in a $2.6 billion deal. The addition brought Musk's two big

green-tech ideas under one roof.

So far, 2017 has been a rocky year for Musk, at least politically. Musk joined President

Business advisory council, a move which caused a huge public backlash. He initially

guarded the act.

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