Tesla Inc. CHIEF Executive Elon Musk has asked workers to return or leave the company, according to an email sent to workers and notified via Reuters.
“Everyone at Tesla must spend at least 40 hours in the week,” Musk wrote in the email sent Tuesday night.
“If he doesn’t show up, we’re going to assume he’s resigned. “
“The older you are, the more visual your presence will have to be,” Musk wrote. “That’s why I lived so long in the factory, so that those on the line would see me running alongside them. If I hadn’t done that, Tesla would have gone bankrupt a long time ago. “
Two resources showed the authenticity of the email reviewed via Reuters. Tesla responded to a request for comment.
Silicon Valley’s big tech corporations aren’t finding it easy to get staff back to work full-time, in the face of resistance from some employees and a spike in coronavirus cases in California.
Tesla has moved its headquarters to Austin, Texas, has its engineering base and one of its factories in the San Francisco Bay Area.
“Of course, there are corporations that don’t want it, but when was the last time they shipped a wonderful new product?It’s been a while,” Musk wrote in the email.
“Tesla has created and will manufacture the most exciting and meaningful products of any company on Earth. It probably wouldn’t happen if I called him. “
One of Musk’s fans on Twitter posted another email Musk sent to executives asking them to work in the workplace for at least 40 hours a week or “leave Tesla. “
Reacting to the tweet, the billionaire, who agreed to privatize Twitter Inc as part of a $44 billion deal, said, “They intend to work elsewhere. “
Some Tesla workers expressed dissatisfaction with Musk’s most recent comments in posts they posted on the unnamed Blind app, which asks users to register the company’s email as evidence of employment at companies.
“If there is a mass exodus, how would Tesla end the projects?I don’t think investors are satisfied with that,” one Tesla worker wrote.
“Hoping it will back off very quickly,” the worker posted.
A California-based workers’ advocacy organization attacked the plan to return to Musk’s office.
“Employers, along with the state government, are finding that the mandatory return of all workers is a recipe for outbreaks,” Stephen Knight, worksafe’s chief executive, wrote in an email to Reuters.
“Unfortunately, Tesla’s disregard for employee protection is well documented, adding its for the county’s public fitness branch early in the pandemic,” he wrote.
In May 2020, Musk reopened a Tesla factory in Fremont, California, defying Alameda County’s lockdown measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus. Tesla reported 440 cases at the plant from May to December 2020, according to county knowledge received through Plain legal data.
Last year, Musk’s rocket company SpaceX reported 132 cases of COVID-19 at its headquarters in the Los Angeles-area city of Hawthorne, according to county data.
In the past, Musk had downplayed the dangers of the coronavirus, saying that “coronavirus panic is stupid” and that young people were “essentially immune” to the coronavirus. He then contracted COVID-19 twice.
Musk said last month that “Americans are looking to go paint,” while Chinese staff “won’t even leave the factory type. “
“They will burn the oil until 3 a. m,” he told a conference.
Tesla’s Shanghai plant has made each and every effort to ramp up production after the closure of the Chinese economic hub forced the plant to close for 22 days.
While some giant employers have permanently followed voluntary work-from-home policies, others, adding Alphabet Inc. ‘s Google, are calling on workers to return to work.
Alphabet required workers to be at least 3 days a week starting in early April, but many workers were approved to work completely remotely.
Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal tweeted in March that Twitter offices would reopen but that painters could continue to paint from home if they preferred.