Elon Musk’s ‘autocratic’ style made SpaceX thrive — but his fixations could threaten its dominance, according to a new book

Marc Piasecki/Getty, Houston Chronicle/Hearst Newspapers/Getty Images, Tyler Le/BI

“Reentry” is a new book about SpaceX’s meteoric rise after its first rocket launch.Its author, veteran space journalist Eric Berger, spoke with Business Insider about his reporting.Elon Musk was key to SpaceX’s success, but his new fixations may have “serious consequences,” Berger says.

If any of Elon Musk‘s ventures have shown him to be a visionary, it’s SpaceX.

The reusable-rocket company has dominated spaceflight and begun paving the road to Mars because of its “mercurial leader” and his “autocratic control,” Eric Berger writes in his new book, “Reentry.”

However, Musk’s veer to the political right and fixation on the social-media app X could undermine that dominance, Berger argues.

Elon Musk near a Falcon 9 rocket at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California in 2018.

David McNew/Getty Images

Berger is a veteran space reporter and the senior space editor at Ars Technica. “Reentry” is based on his on-the-ground reporting from SpaceX launches and facilities, as well as interviews with about 100 former and current SpaceX employees, he says.

Berger spoke with Business Insider about the book, which came out on Tuesday. The interview was edited for length and clarity. Neither SpaceX nor Musk responded to a request for comment.

“Reentry” is a sequel to your 2021 book, “Liftoff,” which covers SpaceX’s founding in 2002 and its struggles to launch its first rocket. Why did you write these two books?

SpaceX now launches 90% of the mass in orbit, has more satellites than anyone by a factor of 10, and for a while was launching every satellite in the Western world.

SpaceX is the most important story in spaceflight this century, so far. I really want to understand it. So I feel privileged to have had a front-row seat to some of that action and talk to all the people involved in it.

Working for SpaceX in the early days sounds intense. Former employees told you about cricket infestations and working overnight or 36 hours straight, among other things. How much were they getting paid to put up with that?

I don’t have access to their salaries, but I get the sense that SpaceX was paying competitive salaries oftentimes in the 2010s. They were competing with Blue Origin and would poach people back and forth.

Basically, you’re going to work super hard at SpaceX, but you’re also going to get to work on cutting-edge stuff, stuff that’s actually going to fly.

After a few years there, with that on your resume, you can write your ticket anywhere in the industry.

Jared Isaacman stands at the hatch of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon during the world’s first commercial spacewalk.

SpaceX

So much of the way SpaceX operates, as you tell it in the book, is Elon Musk’s hands-on management and the way he pushes his workers. Has he ever considered changing his management style? Do you think he should?

I cannot imagine him ever changing. He’s done that for 25 years, and it’s worked by and large — certainly at SpaceX and, to a large degree, at Tesla. He has shown an unwillingness to change with Twitter/X.

I do think he should change the way he interfaces publicly. He is very significantly harming his brand through his political activism. The positions he’s taking appeal to a sizable chunk of this country, but there’s a large part of this country that’s pretty appalled by his behaviors and what he’s saying. I do think, ultimately, that will have pretty serious consequences for SpaceX.

The way I look at it, SpaceX is trying to solve very difficult technical challenges. The problems they’re solving are physics-based.

A Falcon 9 booster lands on a ship after launching astronauts into space.

SpaceX

Whereas Twitter/X is much more of a human interface, regulatory, government-type arena. That’s not physics. I don’t think Elon does very well in those types of environments.

You write about your concern for SpaceX’s future. I’m curious if other people—SpaceXers or former SpaceXers — have told you they share that concern.

I think for a lot of them, there’s this really strong belief in the mission. SpaceX is the only place that they’re going to be able to act on those dreams.

We’ve seen some exceptions, obviously, with the flight attendant issue that Business Insider brought to light, where some people in the company have really spoken up.

But I think, by and large, that working for the company’s mission still overrides concerns that some employees have about his behavior and things he’s saying.

That was one of the challenges with this book: Setting Elon aside, SpaceX is this amazing good news story for the United States.

Space was an industry that was being offshored in a big way until SpaceX came along. Twenty years ago, we were buying most of our rocket engines from Russia. Today, there’s like seven or eight large, new rocket engines being built in the United States.

I think all of the people I talk to are proud of that, even though a lot of them did ultimately have negative experiences with Elon.

What’s surprised you about Elon?

I don’t really understand the entire arc of his changing political views over the last decade.

Ten years ago, he was regularly meeting cordially in the Obama White House about space and other things, and he sort of styled himself as a libertarian.

He has clearly made a hard turn to the right over the last decade.

What implications does that have if he succeeds in getting to Mars in our lifetimes and starting a settlement there?

Elon is now 53 years old. I feel confident saying he’s never going to Mars.

I don’t know the psychological aspects of who ultimately would be willing to go and who would be selected to go, but they are very much going to be on their own.

Sarah Gillis plays the violin while floating in microgravity inside SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spaceship.

Polaris Dawn crew

Elon might have some control on the selection of who goes. But what they actually do when they get there — I don’t know if it’s going to be “Lord of the Flies” or “Star Trek” utopia.

People might see Starship blowing up on its test flights and think that SpaceX is failing. What are the biggest misconceptions you see, and what do you want those people to take away from this book?

SpaceX is like a mullet.

Business in the front: You’ve got the Crew launches, the Falcon 9 program — that’s like the mature adult that has to execute. You cannot screw up human launches or big military launches.

But then you’ve got the party in the back, where you’re experimenting with Starship. I don’t think the regular person really understands what a technological leap Starship is.

Yes, they’re blowing rockets up, but the fact that they’re experimenting on the cutting edge should not take away from the fact that the mature side of the business is executing amazingly well.