Tesla loses three vice presidents in a week

https://electrek.co/2019/07/02/tesla-loses-three-vice-presidents/

by evo_9 • 7 years ago

147 161 7 years ago

electrek.co

anigbrowl• 7 years ago

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css• 7 years ago

This site is blocked for "pornography" on my corporate network

MegaButts• 7 years ago

To be fair, it has the word 'fucked' in the url, so that's not an unreasonable result from a simple spam filter.

ineedasername• 7 years ago

And now you're on the watch list for trying to visit porn at work!

RcouF1uZ4gsC• 7 years ago

All three execs that left this week seem to be significant losses for Tesla, but it might be for the best if Tesla’s fast-paced, startup-like business environment wasn’t for them.

But is a fast-paced, startup-like business environment the best environment for producing thousands of expensive, multi-ton, high speed vehicles that can seriously maim or kill their occupants or bystanders if something goes wrong?

sawmurai• 7 years ago

Well, Boeing on the other hand is having trouble building reliable planes.

api• 7 years ago

The underlying cause of both companies' issues is the same, and it's not organizational size and style. It's complexity. Bugs and edge cases grow exponentially, not linearly, with complexity, and both Tesla's cars and the 737 MAX are far more complex than previous products.

It's similar to the "featureitis" that causes complex software products and platforms to crumble and die over time. Part of why we keep rewriting the universe in software is the need to repeatedly start over to escape a mountain of accreted complexity in some old system. At some point the cost of rewriting the parts we need is lower than the cost of just maintaining the bloat.

ab_c• 7 years ago

Boeing's problems had little to do with being a fast-paced startup-like culture. They were outsourcing a lot of their work to India in an attempt to save money. They cared more about the short-term financial savings and cared less about the quality of work.

cco• 7 years ago

…because Boeing stopped being the measured and conservative company it was and began to chase profits and cut corners in a bid to undercut competition.

^I think that addition is a more complete and fair sentence.

SilasX• 7 years ago

Trouble building one of their new models to be reliable. They have several very mature lines that they have no trouble making reliable.

magduf6• 7 years ago

If you're talking about the 737MAX, there's no evidence to show that plane is unreliable at all.

It will very reliably crash shortly after takeoff if there's a problem with the single sensor that controls the MCAS.

The problem isn't reliability, it's a fundamental design flaw (the engines being too big for the obsolete airframe design) that was bandaged with a fundamentally flawed software hack that was specifically designed to not have any redundancy and to fail easily.

_ea1k5• 7 years ago

It seems to be going pretty well so far. Despite some serious missteps in body design, they've managed to build one of the world's safest passenger sedans. If they were good at their jobs too, it would have been even better.

They've also managed to build out an entire supply chain for building more electric cars yearly than any of their competitors. That doesn't appear to be a feat that will be matched for at least a couple of years, even if Tesla were relatively stagnant. Instead Tesla is aiming to continue 50+% average annual growth for another couple of years at least.

Continue? Yep, their growth story is faster than that of any American car company in the world's history. I'm not sure if there are any worldwide that would compare, but it seems doubtful.

Of course, there are plenty of things wrong too, just as there were when the automotive industry was born and the Durant types ran the industry. But what they've done is absolutely remarkable.

wlesieutre3• 7 years ago

They've proven they can make a car, the part I'm most skeptical is Elon Musk's continued boasting on how far ahead they are with self driving.

cptskippy• 7 years ago

they've managed to build one of the world's safest passenger sedans.

Weren't the 3, X, and S ranked 1, 2, and 3 in the United States? I can only find a 2013 Model S ranking in the European site.

henryfjordan2• 7 years ago

They've also killed 3+ people who were using autopilot.

reitzensteinm• 7 years ago

Did you actually check the growth numbers? If so, how are you defining it? Because Ford was producing a million cars per year when it was 17 years old.

airstrike2• 7 years ago

I'll play devil's advocate and say that every other Auto OEM has produced billions of "expensive, multi-ton, high speed vehicles that can seriously maim or kill their occupants or bystanders if something goes wrong"

mrfredward• 7 years ago

The grandparent comment doesn't claim Tesla is unique for making "expensive, multi-ton, high speed vehicles that can seriously maim or kill their occupants." It claims Tesla is unique for approaching that age old problem with a "fast-paced, startup-like business environment."

Put another way, is it appropriate to "move fast and break things" when human life is on the line?

bsaul• 7 years ago

I’m stunned at the spin the article is trying to give to this news. Like a child who refuses to admit when something is wrong and prefers to keep hoping for some magic hypothesis.

While they’re at it, why not go « maybe they left after 4 years because they realized how amazingly good tesla is and they didn’t want to hold the company on its way to guaranteed success ».

The level of absurdity in this post is just outstanding.

darkteflon• 7 years ago

That’s pretty standard for electrek.

gwbas1c• 7 years ago

As much as I love my Model 3, it has quite a few quirks that a car from a traditional automaker wouldn't have: (nonstandard charging connector, snow falls off the rear windshield into the trunk, no power shades over the sunroof, no place to store sunglasses, ect.)

And, as much as I want Tesla to succeed, they really need to figure out how to get some know-how from standard automakers. I never had a pile of snow fall into the back of my Leaf when I opened its trunk! It also had a sunglasses holder, and I didn't need to use a dongle to plug it into a standard charger.

mauvehaus2• 7 years ago

2005 Honda Civic: Water drains from the trunk lid into the trunk when you open it in the rain. If you open the trunk when there's snow on the rear window, it gets jammed up between the trunk lid and the window.

The traditional automakers aren't immune from this sort of thing.

ryanmercer• 7 years ago

snow falls off the rear windshield into the trunk

That's happened in literally every car I've ever had, when you open the trunk the bit closes to the windshield that becomes the 'bottom' always has an inch or more gap between it and rubber gasket/weather strip. Any snow on the rear window or trunk deck slides down and if there is enough dumps into the trunk, unless it is very wet and can hold itself in a clump.

_ea1k5• 7 years ago

Others have responded to the trunk thing, but I will comment about the "non-standard" charging connector. There was no standard available at the time that Tesla started deploying thousands of high-KW chargers. It is hard to blame them for choosing their own.

Even now, there are only certain regions where the other networks have advantages over Tesla's (coincidentally, the part of the US I'm in is one of those regions). Tesla is currently promising to support other viable networks in the future, presumably by adapters. At the very least, Chademo is expected for the model 3 in the near future, but hopefully CCS as well. Obviously they already support CCS in Europe.

Also, keep in mind that GM is a pretty traditional manufacturer and doesn't even give you a CCS charger without paying for an additional DC fast charging option.

Tesla isn't perfect, cars aren't perfect, but Tesla's are as good as they get in EVs right now.

mprev• 7 years ago

The amplifier in my BMW died after snow fell from the lid into the boot/trunk and shorted it. Utterly crap design.

trymas2• 7 years ago

Just nitpicking on your arguments, but..

snow falls off the rear windshield into the trunk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkSuyXnCSO4

no place to store sunglasses

Most cars me and my family had - had no such thing (though I agree it's very convenient).

I agree that Tesla is mass manufacturing newbie (slow to scale up, compared to the industry veterans), shoddy manufacturing practices/decisions, but they have things sorted where it matters though. Extremely well built batteries with superb longevity (Nissan Leaf's AFAIK are the worst, due to being air-cooled, etc.). Tesla has powerful and more efficient motors/batteries/drivetrain than competitors. Using adapters between power/data connectors is daily occurrence to me. I am not amazed we have this problem with relatively new tech of EVs.

I am not sure about charging. Was there any standards when Tesla started developing their Superchargers and Model S, especially for Tesla's demands for very fast charges? Maybe they did not have any other option?

P.S. all in all if not Tesla breathing into the car giants' backs (and probably if not diesel-gate), most manufacturers will not be aggressively expanding their EV line-ups now. They would do it in 5-15 years time, when more aggressive regulations would kick-in.

senectus12• 7 years ago

2014 Toyota Camry Hybrid, Open the trunk after rain and water falls into the boot (trunk).

Unfortunately this seems to be a common issue with a lot of car designs.

zaroth3• 7 years ago

Turns out from Model 3 sales numbers, safety numbers, and efficiency numbers, the answer to that is a resounding yes.

olivermarks• 7 years ago

'Move fast and kill people'? It is definitely a concern. http://www.tesladeaths.com

jedberg3• 7 years ago

I would assume that Tesla’s pace clashes with what people are used to in the auto industry, and it might be hard for them to adapt.

Or that Tesla is playing fast and loose with the rules and compromising safety, and they felt ethically compelled to leave.

It's sort of hard to make either assumption from the outside. But it definitely says something about Tesla.

Edit: My point here is that three VP departures implies nothing in particular, only that something is changing, and it's quite a logical leap the author is making assuming it is their "fast paced environment".

thebluehawk• 7 years ago

Do you have sources to back up the claim that these people left because of safety or ethical concerns?

From what I've heard, it's a grueling job working long hours and that people get burned out pretty quickly, which is a different issue from saying there are legal, safety, or ethical concerns.

jedberg3• 7 years ago

Do you have sources to back up the claim that these people left because of safety or ethical concerns?

No, none at all, that was my point. The departure of three execs in a week does not imply that it is a fast paced work environment nor does it imply safety issues.

WhompingWindows2• 7 years ago

One of the VPs had left after 4-5 years like clockwork after every position with 5 different automakers. Guess how long he'd been at Tesla? 4+ years. Sometimes, it's not about Tesla magic/curse, sometimes it's just a regular company experiencing regular phenomena.

LoSboccacc• 7 years ago

exactly. like, first question should be something along the line of "how long does Tesla exec shares take to vest?" - Occam razor and all that.

m463• 7 years ago

I was looking at a tesla, so I asked my friend about his buddy who went to work for tesla a couple years back.

"We don't keep in in touch anymore, he's always at work."

radicalbyte• 7 years ago

Now that Tesla have broken ground there are a lot of electric car startups. So these people are in demand.

steve76• 7 years ago

That's good!

I'm routing for Mr. Elon Musk. There's plenty for everyone. It's not a zero sum game.

staticautomatic• 7 years ago

I think you mean "rooting"

nick_kline6• 7 years ago

One good thing about Tesla is they always said their goal is to kickstart the ev transition, and Musk even specifically said it's okay if tesla loses out as long as society moves that way. So that's a noble thing. They actually have a goal. In the mean time they've made a fantastic vehicle that should improve the world.

Separately from that, by all apparent news Tesla is a gosh dang hard working place, and people can't take it forever.

sprafa2• 7 years ago

I think the biggest worry looming is the financials. Everybody is freaking out on their burn rate.

WhompingWindows2• 7 years ago

Who is freaking out about their burn rate? Do you know their burn rate for Q2? Q1 had logistical problems which reduced deliveries made, Q2 is going to look good in comparison.

threeseed• 7 years ago

Everyone. Their stock price plummeted last month.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-stocks-tesla/tesla-st...

sprafa2• 7 years ago

The economist had a good article on how out of control their financials are.

nolok• 7 years ago

Q1 had logistical problems which reduced deliveries made, Q2 is going to look good in comparison.

You make it sounds like Q1 was a one time exception when "problem on the manufacturing lines, deliveries far below planned number" has been the norm for years now.

tropo• 7 years ago

Losing three vice presidents ought to help with the burn rate.

They were insiders at a public company, so perhaps their pay was filed with the SEC.

erikpukinskis• 7 years ago

People freaking out about Tesla is an entire industry. It has happened the entire history of the company, without pause. It means nothing.

izzydata• 7 years ago

I'll gladly do whatever their job was for half the salary. Unless there is some kind of illegal activity involved that I could be implicated for later.

magduf6• 7 years ago

Watch out with statements like this; a lot of corporate executives don't make as much salary as you're thinking. You might be better off with whatever you're doing now than getting half of some executive job that only pays $200-250k.

Balgair• 7 years ago

I've seen structures where they pay ~$50k in cash and then you get ~$150k in stock. But the stock is restricted such that you only can sell it in ~3 years time. Good incentive to keep the stock price up, as you 'bought' it at ~150k but could sell it in 3 years for much more than 150k.

davidw• 7 years ago

Have they checked behind the couch cushions?

refurb• 7 years ago

I'm trying to remain relatively unbiased in my assessment of Telsa, but can anyone come up with a reason for all these executives leaving other than poor business prospects?

Maybe Elon's management style? Maybe I answered my own question.

noodle• 7 years ago

There are a lot more EV companies cropping up now. So, a bigger paycheck might be a major draw for many. Probably compounded by other issues as well, but still. If you're a new EV startup and you know you can't buy out Elon, who else will you try and poach? High level leadership.

new_realist3• 7 years ago

Why would you leave after a quarter of record sales?

nabla9• 7 years ago

I think Tesla's finances combined with the scaling problems are the reason.

All these VP's had traditional auto industry background. What traditional auto-industry does well is manufacturing profitably in large scale. Tesla is just learning to do that. Startup mentality works for luxury cars. It does not work when you have to design for maintainability and big recalls or errors can break the company.

BinaryIdiot2• 7 years ago

The few folks I knew who worked at Tesla told me it's basically 60 hours a week at a minimum. It's not uncommon to find someone sleeping in the office or folks going out to dinner and coming right back to work.

The last person I talked to was looking for a new job. He loved what he was working on and felt proud of his work but was also feeling extremely burned out and wanted to stop working every weekend and evening. He also told me they use _literally every_ technical stack. He had worked on a Ruby app, a Python app, a .Net app, a .Net Core app, and many of them are supposed to work together they were just written that way because whoever started it was more familiar with a specific language.

It doesn't sound like a great place to work for to me. I talked to someone at SpaceX who told me similar things but it sounded like their usage of random tech stacks was at least lower than Tesla's.

gist3• 7 years ago

For a young person 60 hours should not be a big deal. If it is don't work for a hard charging company. Go do something easier. Or don't work for a company 'like that'. Believe it or not some people are not impacted by that kind of lifestyle (of working so much)

magduf6• 7 years ago

A Tesla recruiter recently contacted me, twice, trying to interest me in a job there (embedded software development). I just ignored the emails; I've heard similar stuff about that place, in regards to the excess working hours. No thanks.

bumby2• 7 years ago

This is par for the course in automotive manufacturing. I don't know about the design side of the house, but 60-70 hour weeks in manufacturing were the norm. I'm not sure it should be viewed as unique to Tesla

darkpuma• 7 years ago

I don't know if all smoke indicates a fire, but there has been a lot of smoke coming out of Tesla.

mandeepj• 7 years ago

The average tenure for an executive in the USA is around 2 years. So, it's alright

killerdhmo• 7 years ago

Citation needed?

Tesla loses three vice presidents in a week

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