#419 Kelly Johnson: Skunk Works
Founders
David Senra
4.8 • 2.4K Ratings
🗓️ 16 May 2026
⏱️ 49 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | So a few weeks ago, I made this episode called How SpaceX Works. |
| 0:03.6 | And while I was reading about the way SpaceX operates, I came across this very interesting |
| 0:07.4 | sentence. I want to read this to you. |
| 0:08.8 | It says many of these ideas are not even new. |
| 0:11.3 | Lockheed's Skunk Works ran similar approaches 60 years ago. |
| 0:15.8 | Founder Kelly Johnson's 14 rules reads like a SpaceX operations manual. |
| 0:23.1 | So that made me want to read Kelly Johnson's autobiography, which is called More Than My |
| 0:26.6 | Share of It All. He wrote it when he was 75 years old. |
| 0:30.8 | And the first thing I want to tell you about in the book, I actually want to jump towards the |
| 0:33.6 | end of the book. It's one of the last chapters. The chapter is called It's No Secret, |
| 0:37.2 | and it breaks down how he built and how he ran Skunk Works. But before I jump into the book, |
| 0:43.5 | there's this list of 20 ideas. I want to give you an overview of basically how he ran this |
| 0:47.3 | operation. I think telling you these list of 20 ideas up front will make it easy to remember |
| 0:51.0 | and understand everything that comes after. So number one, a breakthrough program is an organization before it's a design. |
| 0:57.3 | So this is one of maybe the greatest designer of aircrafts of all time. |
| 1:01.9 | In the case of the plane, the SR 71, which Kelly designed all the way back in the 1960s, |
| 1:06.6 | it still holds to this day, 60 years later, it still holds the record for the fastest air breathing |
| 1:11.5 | manned aircraft when Elon Musk is telling his team about the importance of speed and how speed |
| 1:16.9 | is a massive competitive advantage for business he uses the SR 71 as an example let me read you |
| 1:22.4 | this quote from Elon about this he says the best offense and defense is speed. The SR 71 Blackbird, again, a design |
| 1:29.0 | from Kelly Johnson and skunkwarks. The SR 71 Blackbird is a military plane with almost no defense |
| 1:34.2 | except acceleration. It was never shot down, not even once. Over 3,000 missiles were shot at the |
... |
Transcript will be available on the free plan in 6 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from David Senra, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of David Senra and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.

