在放棄攻讀斯坦福大學物理學博士學位之后，埃隆·馬斯克創立了一系列有趣的公司。在20世紀90年代，他是第一批注意到互聯網可以用于發布有用信息（Zip2）、進行在線支付（PayPal）的人。到了世紀之交，他的眼界進一步拓展，看到了商用太空飛行和電動汽車的未來，并創立了SpaceX和特斯拉（Tesla）。這兩家公司發展了很長時間，期間也經歷了一些波折。

不可否認，馬斯克的遠見是決定性的，但是有時，建立兩家十分復雜的公司所需的繁雜事務卻令他飽受艱難。我們不用追溯太遠，只需瞧瞧特斯拉在生產Model 3上的舉步維艱。其部分原因在于該車對機器人的依賴程度過高，而這正是馬斯克的要求。今年春天，這位首席執行官被迫承認：“人類的作用被低估了。”他魯莽的溝通風格，尤其是在推特（Twitter）上的言論，也成為了讓公司分心甚至變得更糟的因素。由于一些推文并未“確保真實性”，馬斯克在上周不得不辭去董事長的職務。他依舊擔任首席執行官，盡管最近他開玩笑稱自己將放棄所有頭銜，成為“與特斯拉毫無瓜葛之人”。

曾有傳聞稱，另一個有遠見的執行者詹姆斯·默多克會接任董事長。不過特斯拉卻選擇了一個完全不同的方向。公司的人選是進入董事會四年的成員羅賓·德霍姆。德霍姆目前是澳大利亞電信運營商澳洲電信（Telstra）的首席財務官和戰略主管。她是首位進入特斯拉董事會的女性，職業經歷豐富，并且專注于哈佛商學院（Harvard Business School）所謂的“商業流程重造”（business process re-engineering）。在加入澳洲電信之前，她在Juniper Networks待了九年，幫助公司將業務重心從電信擴大到云。更早一些時候，她是太陽微系統公司（Sun Microsystems）的戰略規劃部主任，還在豐田汽車（Toyota Motor）的澳大利亞分部管理過各種財務職能。

一位擅長具體經營的行家，對金融有著敏銳的目光，甚至還在傳統汽車制造業有一點經驗？聽起來幾乎與埃隆·馬斯克毫無共同點。不過如果兩人可以像史蒂夫·喬布斯和蒂姆·庫克（他被找來幫助這位健談而有遠見的老板，讓產品線變得井井有條）那樣成為緊密合作的工作伙伴，她似乎也像是對埃隆·馬斯克的完美補充。沒錯，監管機構迫使馬斯克退位了，但這可能也是馬斯克的另一個英明之舉，來看看公司究竟需要什么。（財富中文網）

譯者：嚴匡正

Elon Musk has founded an interesting variety of companies since dropping out of the physics PhD program at Stanford. In the 1990s, he was among the first to see how the Internet could be used to distribute useful information (at Zip2) and pay for online sales (at PayPal). By the turn of the century, his vision was expanding and he founded SpaceX and Tesla, seeing a future with commercial spaceflights and electric cars. It’s been a long and not always smooth journey for those two companies.

Musk’s vision is undeniably critical, but sometimes the detailed work of building two vastly complicated companies has suffered. Look no further than Tesla’s struggles manufacturing its Model 3, in part owing to an over-reliance on robots–at Musk’s behest. “Humans are underrated.” the CEO was forced to admit this spring. His shoot-from-the-hip communications style, particularly on Twitter, has also been a source of distraction, or worse. And it’s thanks to some tweets that hadn’t, shall we say, secured the truth, that Musk had to step down as chairman of Tesla’s board lastweek. He remains CEO, despite joking recently that he’d give up all his titles and become “the Nothing of Tesla.”

Rumors were that it would be another visionary executive guy taking over the chairmanship: James Murdoch. But Tesla has gone in a very different direction. Instead, it named four-year board member Robyn Denholm, currently the CFO and head of strategy of Australian telecom carrier Telstra, as chair. Denholm was the first woman named to Tesla’s board and has had a long and varied career focused on what the folks at Harvard Business School like to call business process re-engineering. Before Telstra, she spent nine years at Juniper Networks, helping broaden the company’s focus from telecom to the cloud. Earlier, she headed strategic planning at Sun Microsystems and oversaw various financial functions at Toyota Motor’s Australian unit.

A nuts and bolts operations expert with a keen eye for finance, and even a little experience with traditional automotive manufacturing? Sounds nothing like Elon Musk. But it also sounds like a perfect complement to Elon Musk, if the pair can form a strong working bond à la Steve Jobs and Tim Cook (who was also brought in to help a voluble and visionary boss get his production lines in order). Yes, the regulators made him do it, but this may be yet another brilliant move by Musk to see what’s needed.