Ex-Tesla employee reveals shocking details on worker conditions: ‘You get fired on the spot.’::Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s ‘ultra hardcore’ work culture is revealed to have led to long hours, unsafe conditions, and harassment for employees.
I’ve never spoken with a Tesla employee, current or former, who hasn’t corroborated this information about working conditions. Doesn’t matter if you are a line worker in the factory or an engineer in the design offices, you are expected to put work above all else, keep your nose down and your mouth shut.
I’ll never buy a Tesla because of the shit that I’ve heard about how they treat their employees there, let alone that dipshit Musk spouting off about full self driving and never following through.
Ditto. I’ve seen lots of rumors that the software stack is an utter mess as a result. Musk’s Uber librarian attitude means he only ever gets junior devs.
The pay has been below market for a while now. He’s tried selling “on the mission” which is totally spoiled now.
I expect other manufacturers are going to catch up quick.
The librarians your just insulted. Oof. Not cool.
It’s a gigantic red flag when the boss supposedly fires people because he doesn’t like the way they looked at him.
As a western European, to me the problem isn’t that they’re fired on the spot, but that a company can actually do that. You guys should’ve fought for your rights.
Welcome to ‘at-will employment’ America, where you can fire anyone for any reason as long as they can’t prove it was because you are one of the protected classes under the Civil Rights Act (does not include LGBT+ people). They can literally fire you because they don’t like your ears.
80 years of living in the church of capitalism will do that to you.
No way. That would be un American. /s
Population density, it’s easy to protest when the capital is just 30 minutes away by bike like it is in a lot of Western European countries.
Conversely, I’m an American, it will take days for me to reach the nearest major city by car… it will take me around 2.5 hours to reach the newest minor City.
I live in North Carolina by the way.
You could drive through three countries in Western europe, by the time I could get to my nation’s capital. My nation’s capital is in virginia, that is the state north of me.
Much of our population lives in California, Texas, and New York, all much much further away from Washington DC then where I live.
Combine that with the fact that a lot of us can’t take any days off of work without falling way behind on our bills, and even if the capital was somewhere where we could all get to it to hold picket signs… there is simply too much to lose, the workers of the world can’t Unite when there is more on the table than our chains. I hate it here
Do you walk to those cities or what?
Do you think that in Europe we all live right next to the capital or even next to one of the top 4 biggest cities of our country?
I literally already said that the times listed were driving. America as a country is too big for protest to be a feasible solution.
Fellow Tarheel here, and bud if it takes you “days” to drive to the nearest major city, you should have your car looked at. I drove from San Diego to Raleigh in 60 hours once.
Notice how that’s almost three days
This example was provided as an estimated upper limit - you could drive to basically the furthest-away big city within 60 hours. Other cities would be substantially less than that, because that’s an upper limit.
Driving from a small town on the western tip of NC… let’s say Franklin, NC, to Washington DC takes only 8 hours… but driving to Knoxville, TN or Atlanta, GA would only take you 2 hours.
If that drive takes you “days” by car, you might have an issue.
they can’t, really. they probably see a lot of wrongful termination lawsuits, and try to settle them out of court.
Wrongful termination suits are hard to win. If they can point at you failing to do your job in any way your case is shot.
The trade off between job security and arbitrary firings and people who are unproductive but can’t be fired.
I do think it’s good to create a healthy culture that respects workers, but I don’t understand why being able to fire an employee is a bad thing
Imagine you’re not allowed to fire people you don’t like who you think are doing a bad job at work
It’s obviously not forbidden to fire people. You just can’t do it like that, because you woke up grumpy that particular morning. Employees are highly protected in France, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be fired.
Indeed. That still happens. Just you have to have a valid reason to fire them. Not liking someone is a petty reason to fire someone. Not doing their job is another thing altogether.
Firing for relatively small mistakes just means people will cover up mistakes in the future leading to them causing serious accidents. People who make mistakes learn from them and not only rarely make that mistake again, but help others learn from that mistake.
I’ll happily admit when something is my fault. And I’ll document and implement changes that help prevent it from happening not just to the teams I lead but as much of the company as I can influence.
Companies pay when people make mistakes.
Why the fuck would you fire someone when you just paid for a lesson that prevents further mistakes?
Same thing when children get punished too harshly or unfairly. They just learn how to lie and hide things
Tesla preys on young and naive employees looking to get their foot in the door.
For instance back on Reddit in many of the engineering subs, there were countless new threads started by fresh engineering graduates who were hell bent on getting a job at Tesla. Many of us would warn them to stay as far away as possible from them (as well as SpaceX) but they wouldn’t listen no matter what we told them.
Most of these people weren’t dumb. Naive, sure, but not dumb. Some of them had a plan where they would bust their asses working at Tesla for a year or two and then that would be a great addition to their resume. Would it work for them? Not sure, but I do know that HR departments do think highly of seeing Tesla or SpaceX on one’s resume, so maybe that plan wasn’t quite so bad. I sure as fuck have no interest in working there, but then again, I like having some time-off.
yea that’s the sort of thing i would have done
Is this actually shocking or does this make perfect sense to anyone who has paid even a shred of attention to Musk’s manbaby tantrums?
but but but elon sleeps on the floor!!!1!! hes so hardworking when hes tweeting literally all day and night!
Power tripping is exhausting.
Also, abusers need to keep a close eye on their victims.
when hes tweeting literally all day and night!
…when he’s Exing all night… ;-)
Is this legal in the US?
sortof. my advice would be to refuse signing a severance or anything else they might give you after that point, and to give it to a lawyer instead. they will probably consult for free and let you know if you have a case. i bet a company like that sees a lot of wrongful termination lawsuits, and they probably like to settle outside of court.
should we start patitioning that elon musk not be involved with any companies. everything ive heard about him makes me think he has no respect for us peasants.
Textbook narcissist play. Expect everyone around you stand at attention to make your dreams happen. Maybe if you offered tangible rewards like bonuses and pay increases instead of vague promises of “exceptional reward” then people would work harder for you. Also, studies prove time and again that working excessive hours leads to diminishing returns. Also, throwing a fucking baby tantrum when a burned-out employee makes a mistake is a great way to lose talent.
Shocking to who?
I am in the odd area of “I’m poor, my family is rich”
My grandma asked me if she should buy Tesla stock. Glad I told her Hell No.
