Diving Deep into Communication Skills — Elon Musk vs Steve Jobs
Both stalwarts uniquely win their public. Their communication do the real magic!
One rising star of entrepreneur’s universe and the other one still caught people with splendid memories — uncrowned kings of billionaire empires — one thing they do more than others is that they communicate.
They talk, vent out ideas, listen to people, answer questions even tricky and filthy ones, and sit in lengthy sessions to satisfy the knowledge hunger.
Today, I’m going to dig deeply the communication skills of Elon Musk and Steve Jobs.
1. Response: Spontaneity or Deliberateness
Musk is spontaneous. A thought flashes in mind, he speaks it out — he doesn’t filter. Watch him in the interview to Joe Rogan or Marques Brownlee, you’ll uncover his spontaneity. Quick answers to so many questions!
At one instant:
Joe (interviewer) humorously remarks, “You were born in a weird time”.
Musk briskly replies, “That’s for sure”.
Joe goes on further, “Strange to have a child while this craziness is going. Does it feel you've had children before is this any weirder”.
Musk replies, “It’s actually, I think, it’s better being older and having a kid.”
Musk is quick — no long stories no construction of answers. Nature has gifted him spontaneity by which he learns quickly and solves rapidly.
But Jobs was a thoughtful and deliberate speaker, not spontaneous. He used to structure his thoughts and convey what’s digestible. He would listen with attention, pause to reflect, and speak with a connected body language.
Read below question and answer.
One of the person in the audience curiously asked Steve Jobs, “ What about OpenDoc (a software created by Apple for compound documents)”.
Jobs replied, “What about it. It’s dead right! yeah well you know, let me say something that’s this sort of generic. I know some of you spent a lot of time working on stuff that we put a bullet in the head of. I apologize I feel your pain but Apple suffered for several years from lousy engineering management. I have to say it and there were people that were going off in eighteen different directions doing arguably interesting things. You look at the farm that’s been created with all these different animals going in different directions and it doesn’t add up. It’s total is less than the sum of the parts and so we had to decide what are the fundamental directions were going in and what makes sense and what doesn’t…”
Jobs gave a long reply.
He didn’t directly come to the point. First he asked a counter question and said some filler phrases to gain time to arrange his thoughts back in his mind. Then he empathized with questioner where he said, “I feel your pain”.
Next he made ‘lousy engineering’ as the villain of his story. Then he related his answer with metaphorical example of ‘farm’. Finally, he told the real point that people in his organization were going in different directions whom (it can be implied) he gave a single direction.
Jobs constructed his answer, connected with the person, presented the background, created a metaphorical example, and finally approached the conclusion. Nobody could grasp his answer at the beginning , unless Jobs had completed his answer.
2. Body Language: Limited or Expansive
Musk focuses on what is he saying — his message. Pivoted on the information he wants to convey, he is less concerned about his body language.
His body often moves in shaky ways and hands don’t maneuver to support. He keeps his arms crossed, hands placed over his legs, and moves his index finger, only sometimes, to point out.
Still Musk’s message resonates. The sole reason is quality of his message. People know his achievements and so listen to his dreamy ideas.
However, Jobs had a masterly control over his body language.
- First, he would use the entire stage during his presentations. He knew at what part, where he needed to be. He would move around deliberately.
- Second, Jobs would keep his arms wide open, moving them appropriately for emphasis. He would use his palms to indicate something and connect with the audience. He would keep an Apple’s device in his hands to show.
- Third, Steve kept strong eye contact with the public in the hall or people asking the questions. Eye contact shown his confidence.
- Fourth, like a motivational speaker, he knew when to show an angry face and when to show a happy face, when to show surprise and when to show fear, and when to show confusion and when to show clarity.
3. Speech: Indistinctive or Clear
Musk hastens his words. You can intuitively get what he is saying but his voice has less clarity. He neither pronounces words properly nor take pauses while transitioning between ideas, and uses many filler words like Ahs, uhms, yeah yeah, you know, okay, right, etc.
But Jobs had clear voice. He used to say each word properly and carefully. He knew where to pause — he even cleverly used pauses to create suspense, particularly when introducing groundbreaking products of Apple. He had a constant pace with deliberate voice intonations and speed variations.
Furthermore, Musk speaks broken sentences while Jobs used to say complete sentences. Musk repeats casually, while Jobs’ repetition was thought out.
4. Purpose: Knowledge or Understanding
Musk’s whole focus is on telling people whatever he knows without reorganizing his thoughts. From complex physics concepts to complicated functioning of his products, he tells everything to his audience, no matter hydrodynamics, astrophysics, microbiology, neurobiology, etc.
He takes journalists in his manufacturing plants and shows them the functioning of machines and manufacturing processes. He introduces the world to his ideas and tells them everything about them. He even doesn’t patent his products because he believes,
“technology leadership is not defined by patents.”
However, Jobs was artistic communicator. He was an amazing storyteller. A single image on the slide — he would explain for hours. He would communicate one idea at one time and respond to one question but at length. His stories had introduction, body, conclusion, heroes and villains, courage and fear, and suspense. Interestingly, when he started the race of Apple computers, he made IBM as the villain.
5. Drive: Variety or Focus
Musk has unlimited drives. He is producing battery-operated cars, manufacturing landmark solar panels, struggling to step on Mars, and extensively working on nanotechnologies. He started Zip2, Paypal, x.com, Tesla Motors, SolarCity and Spacex. Just as his communication style, his practical adventures are quick, ambitious, and diverse.
However, Jobs had focused drive. When he rejoined Apple in the 90s, he instantaneously ordered to reduce the products so he could focus on a few. He never produced many models of mobiles like Samsung did. His single company Apple is much more than all the companies of Elon Musk.
Below is the infographic.
Both, Elon Musk and Steve Jobs, have excited the imaginations. They dream by creativity, turn dreams into reality by management and sell dream by communication.
