Elon Musk told his biographer that showing empathy to a single person is "egotism." The statement sounds insane until you hear his reasoning. And then it still sounds insane. But it explains every management decision he has ever made. His argument: when you show empathy to one person who is underperforming, you are prioritizing that one person's feelings over the entire team that is being held back by their underperformance. The 50 engineers working around the clock don't get empathy. The one person slowing them down gets protected because a manager felt sorry for them. Elon says that is not compassion. It is egotism disguised as compassion because it makes the manager feel good about being kind while punishing the people who are actually performing. Isaacson pushed back on this. He pointed out instances where Elon had brutally criticized employees who were underperforming because of genuinely devastating personal circumstances. One employee had recently experienced the death of a child. Elon's demon mode did not accommodate the context. Elon's response was that the mission is bigger than any individual including himself. SpaceX exists to make humanity multiplanetary. Tesla exists to accelerate sustainable energy. If one person's pain slows the mission then the mission takes priority because the mission affects millions and the person's pain affects one. Whether this makes him a visionary or a sociopath depends entirely on whether you're the one building the rocket or the one standing in front of him when demon mode activates. The people who stay describe it as the most meaningful work of their lives. The people who leave describe it as the most brutal. Both are telling the truth.