From Elon Musk to startup founders, is ruthless behavior a requirement for success, or a side effect of power and pressure?
I remember hearing a story about a young employee at a fast-growing startup who worked so intensely that she barely went home. Instead, she showered at the office gym, slept a few hours on a couch, and returned to her desk before sunrise. In another case, a former employee described a CEO who would fire people impulsively during meetings, sometimes mid-sentence. And then there are the stories everyone has heard: leaders who berate staff, send emails at 3 a.m., or publicly lash out when things go wrong.
At some point, a question begins to form: are these just bad managers, or is there something deeper going on?
More specifically: does the role of a CEO, especially in high-pressure competitive environments, require a certain type of personality? Or does the pressure of the job shape people into becoming more aggressive, impatient, and extreme?
The Archetype of the Ruthless CEO
In modern business culture, particularly in Silicon Valley and high-growth industries, a certain archetype has emerged: the relentless, obsessive, sometimes abrasive leader who prioritizes results above all else.
Few figures embody this more than Elon Musk.
Musk is widely admired for his ambition and execution, but also criticized for his behavior. Reports over the years have described intense work environments, sudden strategic shifts, and highly demanding expectations. A well-known New York Times article detailed how Musk pushed himself and others to extremes, including sleeping on factory floors during production crises.
Similarly, a Washington Post investigation highlighted employee accounts of long hours and high pressure at Tesla. These accounts raise a provocative question: is this behavior an anomaly or a pattern?
A Pattern Across Successful CEOs
Musk is far from the only example. Take Steve Jobs, who was known for his brilliance. Former colleagues frequently described him as demanding and, at times, harsh. In Walter Isaacson’s biography, Jobs is quoted as saying: “I’m convinced that about half of what separates successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance.”
That perseverance often came with intensity. According to a Harvard Business Review analysis, Jobs’ leadership style combined vision with an uncompromising demand for excellence.
Or consider Travis Kalanick. Under his leadership, Uber grew rapidly, but was also criticized for an aggressive internal culture. A widely reported incident captured on video showed Kalanick arguing with a driver, later acknowledging he needed to “grow up”.
Even outside tech, similar patterns emerge. Jeff Bezos has been described as intensely demanding, with a culture built around high standards and relentless performance. A New York Times investigation into Amazon’s workplace described a system where employees felt constant pressure to deliver. Across industries, the theme repeats: extraordinary performance often coexists with extreme leadership behavior.
Personality vs. Situation: Which Comes First?
So what drives this? There are two dominant theories.
1. Personality Selection: One argument is that individuals who become CEOs, especially in competitive or high-growth environments, already possess certain traits like high dominance, low tolerance for inefficiency, strong achievement motivation and willingness to take risks.
Research supports this idea. A study published in the Journal of Managerial Psychology found that CEOs often score higher on traits like assertiveness and openness to experience. From this perspective, the role doesn’t create the personality, but actually it reveals it.
2. Situational Pressure: The alternative view is that the environment shapes behavior. Leading a company, especially a startup or turnaround, is inherently stressful with high financial stakes, constant uncertainty, investor pressure and competitive threats.
Under these conditions, even relatively balanced individuals may become more aggressive, impatient, or extreme. A study from Stanford Graduate School of Business suggests that power itself can alter behavior, increasing impulsivity and reducing empathy. In other words, the job changes the person.
How Power Changes CEO Behavior
To understand CEO behavior, it helps to look at the psychology of power. Research has shown that power can:
- Increase confidence, but also overconfidence
- Reduce sensitivity to others’ emotions
- Encourage risk-taking
A well-cited paper by psychologist Dacher Keltner argues that power can lead individuals to act more impulsively and with less restraint. This aligns with many real-world observations: leaders who interrupt, dismiss feedback, or make bold decisions without consensus.
But there’s another layer: reinforcement. If extreme behavior leads to success, faster growth, better results, and higher valuation, it becomes self-reinforcing. The leader learns that intensity works.
Startups vs. Established Companies
Interestingly, these traits tend to be more visible in certain environments. In startups there is high uncertainty, limited time and constant pressure to prove viability. Therefore, there is often little room for consensus-building. Decisions must be fast, and mistakes can be fatal. This environment rewards decisiveness, even at the cost of interpersonal harmony.
High-Tech vs. Low-Tech
The tech industry, in particular, seems to amplify these dynamics: rapid innovation cycles, winner-takes-all markets and heavy venture capital influence.
By contrast, more traditional low-tech industries often operate with longer timelines and more stable structures, allowing for more measured leadership styles.
Do You Need to Be Ruthless to Win?
This is the core question. There is a persistent belief, especially in startup culture, that success requires a certain level of ruthlessness. That a CEO must be: uncompromising, hyper-focused and willing to make difficult, even harsh decisions. But research suggests the reality is more nuanced.
A study by the Harvard Business School found that while decisiveness and high standards correlate with performance, toxic behavior can undermine long-term success. Similarly, research on transformational leadership shows that empathy, communication, and trust can drive strong performance, often more sustainably. In other words, being demanding is not the same as being destructive.
The Visibility Effect
Another factor to consider is visibility. Extreme behavior is not unique to CEOs. It exists in many professions, but in leadership roles, it becomes more visible, impactful and consequential.
A mid-level manager who loses their temper affects a team. A CEO who does the same affects an entire organization. This creates the illusion that CEOs are fundamentally different, when in reality, their behavior is simply amplified.
Ruthlessness Is a Spectrum
It may be more accurate to think of CEO personality as a spectrum. On one end they are visionary, driven and demanding. Yet on the other they may be impulsive, volatile and dismissive. Many successful leaders operate somewhere in between.
Even figures like Elon Musk demonstrate both sides: extraordinary ambition paired with controversial behavior.
So What Actually Works?
The evidence suggests that the most effective leaders are not necessarily the most ruthless, but the most adaptive. They can push hard when needed, step back when appropriate and balance urgency with judgment. They understand that performance matters, but so do people.
Conclusion: Built or Revealed?
So, is the CEO personality created by the role or selected beforehand? The answer is likely both. Certain traits predispose individuals to leadership roles. But the pressure, power, and visibility of the position amplify those traits, sometimes to extremes.
The real question may not be whether CEOs need to be ruthless. It may be whether they can afford not to be and at what cost. Because in the end, the same intensity that builds companies can also break cultures. And the line between brilliance and dysfunction is often thinner than it appears.
At the end of the day, the psychology behind leadership isn’t just something you study, it’s something you experience. If you’ve ever worked under a leader who was overly harsh or simply toxic, share your story. Those experiences often teach us the most about what leadership should not look like.