4 ms·

I can't believe I used to respect Elon. It's not inherently bad to want people in the office (he's free to run his company how he'd like), but that email (and

I can't believe I used to respect Elon. It's not inherently bad to want people in the office (he's free to run his company how he'd like), but that email (and especially the one sent to more general workers) read like a post on /r/im14andthisisdeep with some guy who thinks he's superior to everyone else.

aero-glide2 4y ago
/u/henrysun1313 tried writing a corp-speak version of this email, I prefer the original! : Dear colleagues - as we get back to working from the office, it is important that all of us do our part to spend time together face to face to enable communication and group alignment. Remote work is not able to help Tesla advance production and innovation at the pace required to meet our goals and fully serve our shareholders. As such, myself and the leadership team are committing to at least 40 hours a week in person and need all employees to do the same. Appreciate everyone's compliance with this policy, where your manager cannot make an exception without my direct approval. Let's charge forward with the Tesla mission and drive results. Thanks Elon
- tombert 4y ago
  I disagree; at least the corp-speak version would have a minimal level of respect instead of coming off like a manchild unwilling to live in the 21st century.
  - jasd 4y ago
    Having been in many managerial discussions where we try to figure out how to sugarcoat the real message, I'd much rather prefer the Elon version. I do agree that some level of empathy in the email would be nice but still hate th corp version. Atleast this way, there is no ambiguity about the seriousness of his ask.
fisherjeff 4y ago
Yeah I found the whole “Tesla would’ve gone bankrupt if not for me working on the factory floor“ thing to be pretty wild, even for him.
- tombert 4y ago
  It just comes off as egotistical drivel. I do think there's value in a CEO working along the factory workers, if only so that it's easier to empathize with their frustrations, but acting like he and he alone is the reason for Tesla's success because he was brave enough to lower himself to the factory-worker-level is just a delusion of grandeur that I have trouble even comprehending.
  - fisherjeff 4y ago
    Yes, exactly. Like, I’ve been in his shoes and would never take credit away from my team like that.
  - travisporter 4y ago
    I concur completely. But I think we live in such a world where success is attributed to the CEO and failure to anyone else.
- xtracto 4y ago
  Not long ago I worked with a similar CEO (minus the success that Tesla had): He was adamant that everybody had return to the office (in the middle of COVID!) because he argued he "didn't know how to guide the startup to be a multi billion dollar company with a remote team", and that he "didn't do remoting". The funny thing is that, there I was, working from an office in another country, and I reported directly to him... remotely. But he wanted to force me to get all the people in my country's office to go back to the office, even if I knew how to work with a remote team.
kcplate 4y ago
> some guy who thinks he's superior to everyone else I’d say that the fact he is a self made wealthiest man in the world (at least occasionally), might demonstrate that he is superior at least in some way to a good portion of the humans walking this earth.

aero-glide2 4y ago

/u/henrysun1313 tried writing a corp-speak version of this email, I prefer the original! : Dear colleagues - as we get back to working from the office, it is important that all of us do our part to spend time together face to face to enable communication and group alignment. Remote work is not able to help Tesla advance production and innovation at the pace required to meet our goals and fully serve our shareholders. As such, myself and the leadership team are committing to at least 40 hours a week in person and need all employees to do the same. Appreciate everyone's compliance with this policy, where your manager cannot make an exception without my direct approval. Let's charge forward with the Tesla mission and drive results. Thanks Elon

tombert 4y ago
I disagree; at least the corp-speak version would have a minimal level of respect instead of coming off like a manchild unwilling to live in the 21st century.
- jasd 4y ago
  Having been in many managerial discussions where we try to figure out how to sugarcoat the real message, I'd much rather prefer the Elon version. I do agree that some level of empathy in the email would be nice but still hate th corp version. Atleast this way, there is no ambiguity about the seriousness of his ask.

fisherjeff 4y ago

Yeah I found the whole “Tesla would’ve gone bankrupt if not for me working on the factory floor“ thing to be pretty wild, even for him.

tombert 4y ago
It just comes off as egotistical drivel. I do think there's value in a CEO working along the factory workers, if only so that it's easier to empathize with their frustrations, but acting like he and he alone is the reason for Tesla's success because he was brave enough to lower himself to the factory-worker-level is just a delusion of grandeur that I have trouble even comprehending.
- fisherjeff 4y ago
  Yes, exactly. Like, I’ve been in his shoes and would never take credit away from my team like that.
- travisporter 4y ago
  I concur completely. But I think we live in such a world where success is attributed to the CEO and failure to anyone else.
xtracto 4y ago
Not long ago I worked with a similar CEO (minus the success that Tesla had): He was adamant that everybody had return to the office (in the middle of COVID!) because he argued he "didn't know how to guide the startup to be a multi billion dollar company with a remote team", and that he "didn't do remoting". The funny thing is that, there I was, working from an office in another country, and I reported directly to him... remotely. But he wanted to force me to get all the people in my country's office to go back to the office, even if I knew how to work with a remote team.

kcplate 4y ago

> some guy who thinks he's superior to everyone else I’d say that the fact he is a self made wealthiest man in the world (at least occasionally), might demonstrate that he is superior at least in some way to a good portion of the humans walking this earth.