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Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

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Re: Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

#301
post #250
post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While this may be true from the perspective of upper management, it is a very shitty way to treat the people who work for you, or would like to.

What's the alternative? Telling all of your employees "hey we're thinking about layoffs that may or may not happen, and we don't know who will be affected" would be a massive morale hit and make people leave. Until the final decision is made -- and this is a hard decision that everyone, including upper management, wants to avoid making until absolutely necessary -- it's best to keep it close to the chest. Just becaus…

Once you've started layoffs, the possibility that there will be layoffs in the future is much higher. Anybody at Tesla who doesn't get hit in the initial round should be thinking about what if there's a round 2. I'd personally be grabbing my parachute, or at least sizing one for myself.

The long slow method gives more time for people to bail the hell out. As a worker, I think I prefer the time.

Re: Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

#303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of Musk's recent comments about "political attacks against him in the coming days". It has since been learned that he had been reached by Business Insider to comment about the sexual abuse case beforehand. He already knew that an article against him was coming so he framed the narrative before it even reached the public. I would not be surprised this was the same here. Tell everyone "Leave if you don'…

Yeah, since the BI story – and in particular his attempt to frontrun it and turn his personal legal troubles into a culture war battleground – I think we can assume pretty slimy tactics from Musk.

I started assuming this after Musk called that cave exploration expert in Thailand a pedophile.

Re: Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

#304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

weeks ? I have a ton of respect for what he's accomplished, but from my perspective, I think he's been pretty chaotic in communications for years .

> he's been pretty chaotic in communications for years True. But he was less impulsive in his actions. The Twitter acquisition is a boondoggle. He could have just tweeted about it.

Musk was a hair's breadth away from taking the SEC "420 funding secured" case to court, and spending who knows how much political goodwill, attention and effort towards that for months or years, instead of building the world's most interesting car company. During the most critical months of Tesla's history. He was convinced he was right and unwilling to let the thing disappear in a settlement. That was in 2018, four years ago. IIRC, only a conversation with Mark Cuban concerning the distraction of a lawsuit convinced him otherwise.

Oh, and this was immediately after the Thailand cave diver pedo fiasco, and immediately before the Joe Rogan marijuana controversy.

Two years before this, in 2016, Tesla bought the unprofitable SolarCity at a price that's truly ridiculous considering Tesla's share price today. I hardly think they've made more than a token profit in the eight years since. The thing seemed like a spur-of-the-moment decision.

I don't think we're seeing a difference of magnitude in Musk's impulsive big decisions. Pretty sure they're strongly correlated with the personality traits that's given us the successes of SpaceX and Tesla already. I think everyone should just lean back, relax and enjoy the drama if that's what they're into. Or read a good book otherwise, and check back on the progress of Musk's companies in five years.

Also need to point out that the Twitter purchase hasn't closed yet. Musk pulling out of that at the last moment would not be very unexpected.

Re: Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

#305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The fact remains that Musk is the techbro Kanye West, and shareholders should sideline him.

They won't because it's a meme stock. There's no way they should be the largest us auto maker. People are or have bought Tesla stock because they like Elon. There's not that much value in the company.

TBH, that's just as much a testament to how pessimistic investors are about other US automakers as it is to how positive they are on Tesla/Musk. F and GM are massively undervalued unless you have really big doubts about their future.

Re: Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

#306
post #3

Make that popcorn. Elon’s going to try and dodge all those laws and rules about layoffs, severance, etc. The only thing he might end up hiring is lawyers.

1) you're likely correct, the "return-to-office" was in part a stealth layoff

2) given that this sort of thing is very common during a downturn, I think Tesla's lawyers probably have a well worked out method on how to do it; I'm not saying it's kosher, but it's common. The only reason this gets so much press is that it's Elon Musk.

Re: Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

#307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're having a conversation with a person you're imagining. Nobody is disagreeing that systems built around transit/biking/etc are better than car-oriented ones. They're saying that an individual in the latter system may still need to drive. In case you've forgotten, your original comment was in response to a specific individual, suggesting that he didn't need to drive.

Google "man walks to work" for heartwarming tales about the kindness of strangers in dystopian Third World America. White-collar workers now get to experience the blue-collar reality that neoliberalism created. Fun times for all, and remember, shared suffering builds community consciousness. Let's all eat cake together!

Sure... Or they could just drive their cars.

Re: Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

#308
post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's the case; they do an accounting thing where they store the money and don't register all of it as profits until they deliver a set of benchmark features. So some of it is recognized as profits right away because the car drives into a tree autonomously in a parking lot, or grinds the wheels against a curb when asked to self park, or when it slams on the brakes randomly when going under an overpass…

If you seriously believe this I have a bridge to sell you LOL. Elon has a history of shilling FSD and FSD payments at let’s say… opportune times in history when Tesla was at risk of running out of runway.

I'm not sure what you mean by "runway" in this context. I think you may be working off of old memes - Tesla has been profitable since 2020.

Re: Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

#309
post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Enter: Open plan offices! I love how now they are justifiably out of fashion when just a few years ago only staid companies had cubicles or offices!

A wild COVID variant has appeared!

Don’t be silly, covid is over. Pay no attention to the 3,250 people hospitalized per day, or the 280 deaths, behind the curtain!

Re: Tesla to Cut 10% of Jobs

#310

A couple of days ago somebody posted this Reddit thread: https://old.reddit.com/r/cscareerquestions/comments/v2lpdw/e... "Tesla expanded massively during Covid, as of now half of the dev team(including me) don’t have parking space or desk. It’s physically impossible for everyone to return to office. "Should I ignore the email, or should I drive to the office and sit under the stairs?" Commenters' general feeling was…

I'm suspecting that we'll see forced return to office as a way to implement layoffs without as much bad PR. Stock will go up since costs will drop, but management will be able to say that is more an issue with return to office rather than a company failing. "We're doing great, it's just that some employees don't share our commitment and focus on doing things well, and making our mission a priority." There has been a…

The main issue with that approach is that you basically also lay off all of your good workers who prefer remote. Maybe it's worth the cost for employers. Idk. We're remote-first and hiring. Looking forward to chatting with these employees once companies try and implement their in-office policies.
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