What was a typical day for him at Tesla or SpaceX? My understanding is his contribution is getting big government contracts, but the companies were essentially run by others.

From what I read his contribution to SpaceX is creation of an informal department of people to deal with his idea and deflecting them from being implemented while feeding elon's ego.

You can easily figure that out for yourself without relying on others to Google it for you. But your understanding is incomplete at best.