At Tesla, Returning to the Office Creates New Problems
Elon Musk’s mandate that staff get back to the office if they want to keep their jobs set off a rush for parking and desks—and a vow from Musk to show up seven days a week himself.
On the evening of June 8, speaking from Tesla’s factory in Fremont, Calif., Elon Musk addressed a few dozen of the electric car maker’s employees in person, and thousands more in a livestream. It was the first time Musk had spoken to the entire staff since announcing the prior week that all white-collar staff would be required to work 40 hours a week at a Tesla office, and that it would lay off 10% of the salaried workforce.
It took Musk a while to get to the recent events. He answered an employee’s question about flying cars, and brought X Æ A-Xii, his 2-year-old son, onto the stage to say hello, two people who watched told The Information. When an employee asked about the return to office policy, Musk softened his earlier stance and said that “exceptional” employees might get a pass when it came to the office mandate, the people said.
As for Musk himself, the CEO had said in an email a few days earlier that he would spend six days a week in the factory, “seven if physically possible.” In the email, which The Information reviewed and which hasn’t been previously reported, Musk added, “BTW, anything I ask others to do, I do myself even more.”