master plans

Back at the end of 2019, we had a breakfast on the topic of goal planning and setting. The intention being that the turn of a decade seemed like an appropriate time to set some moonshots. Boy was I wrong. January 2020 was probably the worst time to set any type of master plan into motion. It’s quite jarring to realize that it’s been a little over three years since then.

I’m not going to say that things have gotten back to normal. In fact, it seems prudent to prepare ourselves for continual change as we look towards the rest of this decade. The revolution in artificial intelligence makes me start to question a lot about what role technology will play in our post-pandemic lives.

The topic of Master Plans has been of interest to me lately as Elon Musk will be posting his Master Plan, Part Three tomorrow, March 1st 2023. This is a surprise for me as I had expected his second plan to be another 10 years long. Looking back now, I’m realizing that Elon never states a time limit for his Master Plan in either part one or two. They just happened to be ten years apart.

At the December 2019 meeting, I truly felt like the act of thinking about five-year plans or ten-year plans was enough to set them into motion. It’s pretty easy to slice history into four or five year segments and reflecting on them. Arbitrarily setting time periods along even intervals seems like the equivalent of believing that “bad things come in threes”.

In Elon’s first plan, he reveals his belief that a solar-electric economy is the primary sustainability solution. At the time of writing, oil demand was very strong and the economy was booming. Not shortly after, the iPhone was released, financial crisis rocked the world, horizontal drilling / fracking revealed energy abundance in North America; you’d think this would have fundamentally altered his plans to build a solar economy around his newly acquired electric car company.

In his second plan, he is quite literally on top of the world. Elon was viewed as the real world Iron Man. Super Engineer. Hyper passionate about making a difference. He’s now known as the guy behind the cool electric car company, boring tunnel company and space exploration company. To a newly graduating engineer, it seems like he can do it all. He’s the ideal engineer and human being.

Stepping into present day, his persona and portfolio are completely different. It makes one question if this is all a part of the plan? Does he need to remain accountable for his own plans?

Over breakfast I look forward to discussing the the act of master planning and the strategy around executing in times of change.