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I imagine that Elon Musk might have been in a similar position in the past, maybe more than once.

Not necessarily. Tesla was originally founded by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning in 2003 before Musk joined as chairman and major shareholder in 2004. Musk became CEO out of necessity since he was already CEO of SpaceX.

Being like Musk is not the norm. In fact, he has publicly admitted in an interview he did with Bill Gates about China, that combining two CEO roles makes for a terrible work-life balance -- he wouldn't wish it on anyone.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tesla,_Inc.#Roadster_and_priva...

If a plan has 'but it worked for Elon Musk' as one of the important underpinnings that will almost certainly work against you. (Unless, of course, if you're Elon Musk.)

How so ?

For one, he invested tens of millions of his personal assets into his companies, so having tens of millions to put into a startup is one prerequisite

So, step 0 would be having real-world experience building a viable business, which Musk gained from Zip2 and PayPal.

The whole reason his name is mentioned here is because is somewhat exceptional.

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