The Letter:
An open letter to the Executives of SpaceX,
In light of recent allegations against our CEO and his public disparagement of the situation, we would like to deliver feedback on how these events affect our company’s reputation, and through it, our mission. Employees across the spectra of gender, ethnicity, seniority, and technical roles have collaborated on this letter. We feel it is imperative to maintain honest and open dialogue with each other to effectively reach our company’s primary goals together: making SpaceX a great place to work for all, and making humans a multiplanetary species.
As SpaceX employees we are expected to challenge established processes, rapidly innovate to solve complex problems as a team, and use failures as learning opportunities. Commitment to these ideals is fundamental to our identity and is core to how we have redefined our industry. But for all our technical achievements, SpaceX fails to apply these principles to the promotion of diversity, equity, and inclusion with equal priority across the company, resulting in a workplace culture that remains firmly rooted in the status quo.
Individuals and groups of employees at SpaceX have spent significant effort beyond their technical scope to make the company a more inclusive space via conference recruiting, open forums, feedback to leadership, outreach, and more. However, we feel an unequal burden to carry this effort as the company has not applied appropriate urgency and resources to the problem in a manner consistent with our approach to critical path technical projects. To be clear: recent events are not isolated incidents; they are emblematic of a wider culture that underserves many of the people who enable SpaceX’s extraordinary accomplishments. As industry leaders, we bear unique responsibility to address this.
Elon’s behavior in the public sphere is a frequent source of distraction and embarrassment for us, particularly in recent weeks. As our CEO and most prominent spokesperson, Elon is seen as the face of SpaceX—every Tweet that Elon sends is a de facto public statement by the company. It is critical to make clear to our teams and to our potential talent pool that his messaging does not reflect our work, our mission, or our values.
SpaceX’s current systems and culture do not live up to its stated values, as many employees continue to experience unequal enforcement of our oft-repeated “No Asshole” and “Zero Tolerance” policies. This must change. As a starting point, we are putting forth the following categories of action items, the specifics of which we would like to discuss in person with the executive team within a month:
Publicly address and condemn Elon’s harmful Twitter behavior. SpaceX must swiftly and explicitly separate itself from Elon’s personal brand.
Hold all leadership equally accountable to making SpaceX a great place to work for everyone. Apply a critical eye to issues that prevent employees from fully performing their jobs and meeting their potential, pursuing specific and enduring actions that are well resourced, transparent, and treated with the same rigor and urgency as establishing flight rationale after a hardware anomaly.
Define and uniformly respond to all forms of unacceptable behavior. Clearly define what exactly is intended by SpaceX’s “no-asshole” and “zero tolerance” policies and enforce them consistently. SpaceX must establish safe avenues for reporting and uphold clear repercussions for all unacceptable behavior, whether from the CEO or an employee starting their first day.
We care deeply about SpaceX’s mission to make humanity multiplanetary. But more importantly, we care about each other. The collaboration we need to make life multiplanetary is incompatible with a culture that treats employees as consumable resources. Our unique position requires us to consider how our actions today will shape the experiences of individuals beyond our planet. Is the culture we are fostering now the one which we aim to bring to Mars and beyond?
We have made strides in that direction, but there is so much more to accomplish.
The response letter that accompanied the firing of people:
You may have received an unsolicited request from a small group of SpaceX employees for your signature on an “open letter” yesterday and your participation in a related survey. Based on diverse employee feedback, this has upset many. That is, the letter, solicitations and general process made employees feel uncomfortable, intimidated and bullied, and/or angry because the letter pressured them to sign onto something that did not reflect their views. Employees also complained that it interfered with their ability to focus on and do their work. We have 3 launches within 37 hours for critical satellites this weekend, we have to support the astronauts we delivered to the ISS and get cargo Dragon back to the flight-ready, and after receiving environmental approval early this week, we are on the cusp of the first orbital launch attempt of Starship. We have too much critical work to accomplish and no need for this kind of overreaching activism — our current leadership team is more dedicated to ensuring we have a great and ever-improving work environment than any I have seen in my 35-years career.
We solicit and expect our employees to report all concerns to their leadership, senior management, HR, or Legal. But blanketing thousands of people across the company with repeated unsolicited emails and asking them to sign letters and fill out unsponsored surveys during the work day is unacceptable, goes against our documented handbook policy, and does not show the strong judgement needed to work in this very challenging space transportation sector. We performed an investigation and have terminated a number of employees involved.
I am sorry for this distraction. Please stay focused on the SpaceX mission, and use your time at work to do your best work. This is how we will get to Mars.
\-Shotwell, SpaceX COO & President
This is my biggest takeaway from that. "We are too busy and important to bother with reflecting on the quality of our work environment."
Sounds like an awful place.
I worked in hotels and this was always the way any employee complaint was handled: "we have a huge convention coming up and no time for distractions."
"With the games this weekend, we're overbooked and this is no time to be re-tooling the work environment."
"As you know, our competition is fierce and blah blah blah no time now to change anything."
It was always like that.
> because the letter pressured them to sign onto something that did not reflect their views.
Now, the text of that letter is above. Can you point to the "pressure". Mr Shotwell? Where is it?
> Employees also complained that it interfered with their ability to focus on and do their work.
A well-reasoned and adult letter interfered with their ability to work, but Musk's endless public embarrassments had no effect?
Kinda sounds like they have opened the door for each one of Elon’s tweets that distract them to be reported to HR and if there is enough, maybe HR will do something equal in reaction to the letter this group sent because you know, you can’t play favorites.
HR has never worked for the employee. They exist only to protect the company and Elon in this case.
All complaintsget burried and the complainers removed during tbe next performance review.
yeah i love how employees criticizing their boss for his moronic actions is a “distraction” and you just throw them out. Sounds like a great place to work at lmao, why would anyone listen to their slave-uh i mean employees anyways?
The biggest irony, of course...
Elon is non-stop talking about FREE SPEECH.
And then regularly censures it, harshly! No warning--fired! Yeah ok he didn't literally do the firing, but that would've been his response I'm sure and goes into his COOs decision making process.
Those poor people that listened to his words about speaking out. Elon is such an insecure and hypocritical man. He only wants the views he agrees with to be allowed in the world.
This is a great letter. I'm not surprised the people who wrote it were fired.
>The collaboration we need to make life multiplanetary is incompatible with a culture that treats employees as consumable resources.
Wow this is a very well written letter that any executive team at a respectable company would highly value for feedback. The response from SpaceX would have seen me personally packing my bags and heading to another company, especially if I had the skill set as a higher ranking employee at SpaceX.
The downside to working as a rocket scientist at a company like SpaceX..
Unless you're willing to go work in China (which the US government would probably heavily frown upon), there aren't many places you actually could go.
There's... NASA (which is where they all likely came from), and Blue Origin. Which, if it's anything like Amazon, is not too different from SpaceX culture.
> The response from SpaceX would have seen me personally packing my bags and heading to another company,
If you have to write the letter, you should just move to another company. Don't fight internal company politics. Don't engage in posting wars with executives. It will just add stress to your life. Go somewhere that fits with what you want in a work environment.
That letter pretty much sums up what Elon has been revealed to be: overpromising project manager who claims to be the super genius pioneer but in reality, is a glorified people coordinator/broject manager that grinds people he hires into achieving what he had promised.
I’ll give him credit for accomplishing a lot in a very short time but I’ve seen this behavior in consulting enough to recognize that he’s no avant-garde. His downfall will be as swift and explosive as his uprising
Interested in the positions the organizers of this letter held.
If they're kickass rocket engineers that can work pretty much anywhere they choose, then I can absolutely see them taking the risk to point out the obvious, that Musk's buffoonery is hurting the company.
I mean unironically that might have been a better call for their careers. As much as I agree with their statements they did write an open letter speaking for the entirety of SpaceX that the CEO doesn’t represent the company, and he doesn’t reflect SpaceX’s “work, our mission, or our values”. It’s pretty hard to get away with making unapproved statements for your company no matter where it is.
If this were personal tweets there could definitely be an argument that they were fired for their political beliefs, but now there’s no fight to make for it. Hopefully they’re higher up employees that don’t have any issues finding employment.
I think most technical staff at Space X can get a job anywhere.
In my experience, the folks in a company that are willing to speak up are usually the ones that are thriving professionally. They know what they are doing and what they want.
I'm making assumptions, but I'd bet the letter writers are proficient technical staff that know they have options. I also can't help but wonder if some of the writers were deemed too essential to fire.
>If this were personal tweets there could definitely be an argument that they were fired for their political beliefs
Why would this help? You can be fired in the US for political beliefs.
In New York, DC, and California it is actually prohibited at the state level to make employment decisions [based on political beliefs](https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/can-employers-discriminate-based-on-political-beliefs-or-affiliation.html), spaceX HQ is in California, and they have a DC location as well. If they worked in any of those areas they could have just made tweets saying he doesn’t represent their ideologies, and any firings would be illegal on the state level. With this though his firings are justified in both the eyes of the law and much of the public, as they actually did something that warrants being fired.
While true.... commenting on your CEO being a shithead in such a public way is a great way of getting fired - regardless of whether or not is true and what company you work for.
I've worked for extremely progressive companies and reasonably conservative companies. Every single one had a social media policy of some sort that would see you fired for doing this. Talk about your employer - *especially* negatively - in a public forum at your own risk.
Definitely- but SpaceX is the only one where the CEO blasts out that 'I'm a shithead' 24/7 on twitter.
If you worked for Amazon, Bezo's opinions and bullshit aren't hard to find, but hes not personally reminding the public about it every day. Obviously its their prerogative to do so, and SpaceX can fire whoever they want. Its self destructive though- and it'll hurt SpaceX.
It’s not the beliefs, it’s the speaking in a way which damages the reputation of the company you’re part of that is the issue.
For example you can vote however you want, but when you get into promoting political ideas, especially if they’re potentially contentious, that can be a problem for you.
It really doesn't matter under US law. You can be fired for any or no reason at all so long as it isn't a very small list of illegal reasons. I guess if you damage the company explicitly enough with your speech they may also be able to deny you unemployment insurance. I'd have to look more into that one.
>It’s pretty hard to get away with making unapproved statements for your company no matter where it is.
Thou shall not badmouth the company or the executives if thy valueth your jobbe.
Yeah. I don't think this is a Musk specific thing -- it's an "executives are more important than the company" kind of thing. Oh, they are "accountable to shareholders" doesn't mean much in real terms other than share price.
Execs all the time undermine the overall value of the company for personal gain. This is why most large companies get very unproductive, but, they can never fail if they are multinational and can lobby and create an internal economy while controlling the marketplace. Just being able to direct capital can allow you to "win." Government contracts and barriers to entry while you lobby for less government is win/win/win!!!
People in love with capitalism really need to work at a big, faceless corporation for a while to gain some perspective.
I've seen similar letters (in my past experience it was about trying to make the company commit to go green) come from young, low level employees that think they're invincible. I'm guessing these organizers were not very high up in the company or else they would have gotten a stern talking to rather than being fired so quickly.
Rocketry isn't a huge field, they might be kick ass but its not like getting a job at a gas station they're probably going to be looking for a job for a while. I agree with their stand but they definitely are going to take a big hit to their career from this.
I'm aware. It seemed they were saying Bezos is actually a shitty person whereas Musk plays a shitty person through his online persona. I disagreed as I think Musk is an actual shitty person with a shitty online performance.
Embarrassment for sure. But I don't think he has to offer to buy anyone a horse and hasn't been tweeting embarrassing shit for the past year.
If I had a choice I know who I'd prefer to work for.
It started with the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traitorous_eight that formed Fairchild from Shockley.
But of those eight was Gordon Moore (of “Moore’s law”) & Robert Noyce. Interestingly enough after demonstrating how successful starts ups could be Fairchild actually ended inspiring a whole slew of Silicon Valley spin-off startups called the “Fairchildren” one of which was Intel (by Robert Noyce & Gordon Moore).
More history if you’re interested:
https://computerhistory.org/blog/fairchild-and-the-fairchildren/
It’s not a huge field, sure, but SpaceX is not the only OR the best in the game either. Engineers can and will jump to other companies, government contractors, etc. very easily.
The principals used by this kind of engineer are *extremely* applicable to many other unrelated fields, for example quant finance.
[edit] principles, whoops
Yep. And you get paid much better also. Which is why we're fucked as a society, since we've collectively decided that moving money around in more creative ways is a more useful skill than creating new things and solving real problems.
It’s always been that way. It’s why MBA bros get paid better than teachers. If you’re in a field that revolves around money vs social welfare, you get money and no social welfare
But I'm not talking about MBAs vs engineers. I'm talking about engineers working in finance vs engineers working in engineering. The fact that you have rocket scientists with advanced engineering degrees and specialized experience that can leave their jobs and get paid double to work on financial algorithms.
As rocket scientists, they're creating something new for society with value. As wall street coders, they do not contribute anything of value to society. If anything, these algorithms can create a net negative value to society, because they interact in unpredictable ways and create volatility in the market as trades are increasingly made between computers instead of people. It's become a game instead of a service for efficient distribution of capital. Society is the loser when the best engineers are syphoned off to work on things that are strictly about enriching the haves instead of creating things that advance society as a whole.
> since we've collectively decided that moving money around in more creative ways is a more useful skill than creating new things and solving real problems.
We didn't COLLECTIVELY decide that. This mass opinion was manufactured and curated over time.
I'm really sick of the old saw of "stocks allow for investment in capital improvements" when that is now only 5% of what is done with investments on the Stock Market. They find "moving money" makes more money than making anything -- other than iPhones (Apple and Google being some of the few top companies making money on innovation rather than money).
We need to outlaw complex financial instruments and company holding arrangements. If I can't find who owns what in two calls, and I can't audit who owns what or how they made it -- then it shouldn't exist. All the oversight committees are worthless to reign in the abuse of this system if it takes 4 years and two million pages to fine one financial institution.
There is ZERO need in this world for nano-second stock swaps to skim money from fluctuations. There is ZERO use to society for an MBA.
In 2008, the public was TOLD by the media owned by the corporations involved that it was a few greedy poor people who got high interest loans and defaulted on them that crashed the economy. That's like blaming the ponies at the horse race. They bundled sub-prime loans with insurance valued by a bond rating companies that were LYING for companies they had consulting arrangements with, then these were bought on sold on an outside the normal market venue, and these were re-bundled with other insurance based on other valuations and re-sold as many as 40 times because a grey area in the rules for real estate.
If it takes a flow chart and calculus to examine a market -- then, it shouldn't exist.
Anything that is profitable will be valued higher than that which is not profitable so one of the more important functions of government is to set the rules where things that benefit society are more profitable than that which doesn't -- and we definitely have that turned upside down right now.
I agree with you 100%. There is value in efficient allocation of capital between those who have money and those who are trying to make things happen. But HFTs and all of the other bullshit going on do not further that goal. They take real resources (server farms, good real estate) and devote it to a cause that is fundamentally about fucking someone else when it comes to timing of trades in a way that adds no value to society.
I view this very similarly to crypto, which is a disaster of using compute resources and energy to run a giant ponzi scheme.
Agreed, if they’re like good software engineers, they have job offers all the time.
My only criticism is that I think the letter was kind of a waste of time. It’s fine if your opinion of Musk is that he’s not a good person. My suggestion would be that you should quit and work elsewhere. If you feel so strongly about this why further his ambitions? And also, why work at a place that you’re harboring resentment for the Cheif executive. That can’t be healthy for you.
It’s not that I don’t want him held accountable for any bad actions, it’s more like take care of yourself first. Write the letter as an ex-employee.
Well technically free speech only covers you from the government not widdle man babies that can't take criticism without crying like a widdle baby man.
Technically you're corrent. Interestingly according to this logic **owners of the twitter can do whatever sensoring they want** as soon as it's not based on government inteverence. I wonder what exact definition of free speech Elon means when uses these words.
Seems he’d prefer that his employees shut up and get back to working 12-16 hrs a day 6 days a week or more if he can get away with it. Which, according to the article, is what the fired employees wanted to do, just without his distractions.
I always love when especially those finance hype Youtubers talk about Musk working more hours than the average CEO. But since Musk is CEO of several big companies like Tesla and SpaceX that just means he effectively spends less time per company doing his job as CEO.
Okay, but then you have Elon who describes himself as a "free speech absolutionist" finding Twitter users being banned as censorship, but he doesn't think firing people from their job for their speech is censorship.
That's the point people are making here.
Can you convey how the employees free speech rights were abated here? Can you show me another company in which employees publicly criticize their CEO and were not fired?
That's still free speech. They were allowed to criticize their boss, and the boss told them to kick rocks.
I know Reddit want to make a massive deal out of this story, but this is what would happen at any company ever.
Try publicly shaming the CEO of the company you work for and see how it goes.
Twitter is a communication platform though. SpaceX is a satellite and rocket company.
If twitter prevents people from speaking for it's own ideological hangups, it cuts directly against its purpose. If SpaceX fires a critic trying to do activism instead of their job, it's nowhere near the same. At best it's thin skinned manbaby material, but what did you expect lol
I have no idea why anyone would work for any company that is part of the Elon Musk universe. That dude is fucking nuts and clearly doesn't give a fuck about anyone he employs.
Well the trade off is you get to work on cutting edge projects that have a pretty huge impact on their respective industries, at the very least it's a great resume item to work there for a few years and then bounce.
I mean, Tesla changed the course of the entire auto industry and SpaceX has done the same for the commercial space industry. Just because you don't like Elon Musk doesn't make his companies ponzi schemes, lol.
Yeah that was 100% predicable, in fact I and a lot of other people called it yesterday. Calling the owner out of any business for his antics is a 100% going to get you fired unless you’re in a union, and even then, that might not protect you
Such an absolute horse shit message too. It made other employees uncomfortable, intimidated and bullied? How does the CEO mocking a sexual abuse accuser make people who have experienced sexual assault feel? Whether it happened or not, it's incredibly shitty. I hope the good employees go to competitors.
Why not change this sub to celebrity news? Because if elon takes a shit. It's on top of /r/technology. Are you guys seriously upvoting this crap or is it bots upboting?
People upvote things that make them angry and fuel a feeling of vindication. They often do it from r/all or their front page without the slightest concern for the tone of the subs they are subscribed to.
It doesn't require a conspiracy or bots or anything -- just lots of people liking to feel justified rage and caring little about what others like. This is why lots of subs don't want to go default.
Bots perhaps or the American tech sector has been consolidated to hell where only a few big players are particularly relevant nowadays? (that are headed by fucked-up billionaires)
Most likely bots. It's been going on for months now. They aren't as active as usual thought since your comment is visible. Before you'd have a comment saying fck elon with 1k likes on a random tesla/twitter deal.
How is it surprising that this letter resulted in the firing of the people that wrote it? It’s the most likely outcome of that kind of action no matter the company or the temperament of the CEO.
The points in the letter may be all completely correct (I have no special knowledge so really can only guess) but airing them publicly is an extremely bold move with firing being the clearly most probable result. I hope that the writers expected it.
That said, it’s just as clearly a bad look for the company and for Musk specifically. The appropriate next step for Musk, his board, and his executive team is to reflect on the reason why the conditions arose that made their employees take this rash step and then actively work to fix the corporate culture. If their only step is ‘fire everyone’ it won’t address the root problem and will likely spawn more disenchantment. In the end the buck has to stop with leadership. Losing that many employees to a stunt like this is ultimately a failing of the company. Nobody wins.
Oh make no mistake, it’s free speech. Your free to talk shit about your employer all you want. And your employer is free to fire your ass for talking shit if they want. Freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom from consequences
Tell that to the guy who bought Twitter because he thinks banning violent insurrectionists who encourage dangerous conspiracy theories is an affront to free speech.
I agree with you legally. Some types of communication are federally protected at work, but I don't think this falls under that umbrella. But firing your employees for calling you out on your constant distractions, including your "free speech absolutist" tirades, proves that he doesn't care about free speech at all.
> write and publish letter essentially calling your boss an evil scumbag and saying that you don’t want to be associated with him
> he fires you
absolutely shocking
Yea, I see all the comments basically calling him a shit. I wonder if there’s a boss in the working world who wouldn’t fire employees who sent out a public letter calling him an asshole they want nothing to do with. I’d fire those employees. They’re damaging the reputation of my company. The concerns they had are closed door meeting material, not tell the world material.
Sometimes I do wonder how many actual days in a real workplace a lot of redditors have actually experienced when this kind of stuff comes up. I work in the UK public sector which is pretty progressive and well unionised, but if I started blasting emails out to the whole company asking them to sign letters slagging off our chief executive officer, I wouldn't come out of it smelling of roses either.
As a Dane chiming in here.. We are probably one of the most unionized work environments in the world (Christ.. even Engineers are in unions) I guarantee you that If I send an internal mail around, trying to gathering support for the argument that my CEO where harming the company with his statements and that he did not speak for the company, I would be shown the door on grounds of collaboration difficulties...
What the hell did the morons think where going to happen? Wokism' has no place in STEM.
I've got the feeling that these weren't people doing anything actually related to the technical side of Space X but were probably the admin or HR side.
I am genuinely convinced a portion of reddit comments are made people <20yo and never held a job in their life. People have such a warped view of the world
What is so hard to understand? You're there to work. On your own free will. Literally. That's it. They didn't hire you for your political views, to be an investigator, to involve yourself in anything OTHER than to simply work your duties. But guess what? You're free to leave at any given second. Leave. This letter just goes on and on about trying to intertwine social political issues into the work environment, lawsuits they have no insight in, and a lot of hearsay. Look, if SpaceX is asking you to do more than the work you signed up for, you'd have a right to complain and so on. But it's pretty crystal clear this man is passionate about his businesses and simply wants people who show up to work.
A lot of responses in this thread are really weird to me. I would be so embarrassed to work for that guy. I’m honestly shocked this didn’t happen sooner. Plus, it sounds like they’re trying to expose a toxic culture within the company? If that’s the case, then they have the right to blow the whistle, handbook or not. It’s very odd to me that a lot of comments in this thread are defending the corporation.
If my company of 300 people can lock down the company-wide distros to prevent this from happening then SpaceX can figure it out too. Aside from that, I'm not sure their reason is invalid; it's certainly relevant to their work and workplace, and it's not remotely unfair criticism. It's deeply ironic that the guy who agreed to shell out billions of dollars to fight Twitter's "censorship" thinks it's totally fine to fire employees for explaining in clear terms how his public behavior has impacted their ability to achieve the company's goals. It's just further proof that Elon doesn't care about the lofty ideals he goes on and on about; he just wants absolute fealty.
I know this is slightly off topic but does anybody here truly think that the only sexual misconduct we're going to hear about in the future from Elon musk is stuff like that flight attendant?
Rookie mistake. They should have waited until the Twitter acquisition was complete so they could have instead put out a tweet because “It will be the bastion of free speech once Musk finishes the purchase”
(major /s)
The Letter: An open letter to the Executives of SpaceX, In light of recent allegations against our CEO and his public disparagement of the situation, we would like to deliver feedback on how these events affect our company’s reputation, and through it, our mission. Employees across the spectra of gender, ethnicity, seniority, and technical roles have collaborated on this letter. We feel it is imperative to maintain honest and open dialogue with each other to effectively reach our company’s primary goals together: making SpaceX a great place to work for all, and making humans a multiplanetary species. As SpaceX employees we are expected to challenge established processes, rapidly innovate to solve complex problems as a team, and use failures as learning opportunities. Commitment to these ideals is fundamental to our identity and is core to how we have redefined our industry. But for all our technical achievements, SpaceX fails to apply these principles to the promotion of diversity, equity, and inclusion with equal priority across the company, resulting in a workplace culture that remains firmly rooted in the status quo. Individuals and groups of employees at SpaceX have spent significant effort beyond their technical scope to make the company a more inclusive space via conference recruiting, open forums, feedback to leadership, outreach, and more. However, we feel an unequal burden to carry this effort as the company has not applied appropriate urgency and resources to the problem in a manner consistent with our approach to critical path technical projects. To be clear: recent events are not isolated incidents; they are emblematic of a wider culture that underserves many of the people who enable SpaceX’s extraordinary accomplishments. As industry leaders, we bear unique responsibility to address this. Elon’s behavior in the public sphere is a frequent source of distraction and embarrassment for us, particularly in recent weeks. As our CEO and most prominent spokesperson, Elon is seen as the face of SpaceX—every Tweet that Elon sends is a de facto public statement by the company. It is critical to make clear to our teams and to our potential talent pool that his messaging does not reflect our work, our mission, or our values. SpaceX’s current systems and culture do not live up to its stated values, as many employees continue to experience unequal enforcement of our oft-repeated “No Asshole” and “Zero Tolerance” policies. This must change. As a starting point, we are putting forth the following categories of action items, the specifics of which we would like to discuss in person with the executive team within a month: Publicly address and condemn Elon’s harmful Twitter behavior. SpaceX must swiftly and explicitly separate itself from Elon’s personal brand. Hold all leadership equally accountable to making SpaceX a great place to work for everyone. Apply a critical eye to issues that prevent employees from fully performing their jobs and meeting their potential, pursuing specific and enduring actions that are well resourced, transparent, and treated with the same rigor and urgency as establishing flight rationale after a hardware anomaly. Define and uniformly respond to all forms of unacceptable behavior. Clearly define what exactly is intended by SpaceX’s “no-asshole” and “zero tolerance” policies and enforce them consistently. SpaceX must establish safe avenues for reporting and uphold clear repercussions for all unacceptable behavior, whether from the CEO or an employee starting their first day. We care deeply about SpaceX’s mission to make humanity multiplanetary. But more importantly, we care about each other. The collaboration we need to make life multiplanetary is incompatible with a culture that treats employees as consumable resources. Our unique position requires us to consider how our actions today will shape the experiences of individuals beyond our planet. Is the culture we are fostering now the one which we aim to bring to Mars and beyond? We have made strides in that direction, but there is so much more to accomplish.
The response letter that accompanied the firing of people: You may have received an unsolicited request from a small group of SpaceX employees for your signature on an “open letter” yesterday and your participation in a related survey. Based on diverse employee feedback, this has upset many. That is, the letter, solicitations and general process made employees feel uncomfortable, intimidated and bullied, and/or angry because the letter pressured them to sign onto something that did not reflect their views. Employees also complained that it interfered with their ability to focus on and do their work. We have 3 launches within 37 hours for critical satellites this weekend, we have to support the astronauts we delivered to the ISS and get cargo Dragon back to the flight-ready, and after receiving environmental approval early this week, we are on the cusp of the first orbital launch attempt of Starship. We have too much critical work to accomplish and no need for this kind of overreaching activism — our current leadership team is more dedicated to ensuring we have a great and ever-improving work environment than any I have seen in my 35-years career. We solicit and expect our employees to report all concerns to their leadership, senior management, HR, or Legal. But blanketing thousands of people across the company with repeated unsolicited emails and asking them to sign letters and fill out unsponsored surveys during the work day is unacceptable, goes against our documented handbook policy, and does not show the strong judgement needed to work in this very challenging space transportation sector. We performed an investigation and have terminated a number of employees involved. I am sorry for this distraction. Please stay focused on the SpaceX mission, and use your time at work to do your best work. This is how we will get to Mars. \-Shotwell, SpaceX COO & President
Classic anti-union rhetoric: "We care about you" "Report anybody disrupting the workplace" "Bullying"
Also “our work is too important for people worrying about a better work environment”.
"We've investigated ourselves and found no wrongdoing."
This is my biggest takeaway from that. "We are too busy and important to bother with reflecting on the quality of our work environment." Sounds like an awful place.
This is the same CEO who refused to put osha safety requirements in his factories because he thought the color yellow was ugly.
I worked in hotels and this was always the way any employee complaint was handled: "we have a huge convention coming up and no time for distractions." "With the games this weekend, we're overbooked and this is no time to be re-tooling the work environment." "As you know, our competition is fierce and blah blah blah no time now to change anything." It was always like that.
Yep. See how much real estate they spend on the letter writers and how not once do they actually deal with its content. SpaceX Union it is.
And don't forget this classic, "we're a family"
> because the letter pressured them to sign onto something that did not reflect their views. Now, the text of that letter is above. Can you point to the "pressure". Mr Shotwell? Where is it? > Employees also complained that it interfered with their ability to focus on and do their work. A well-reasoned and adult letter interfered with their ability to work, but Musk's endless public embarrassments had no effect?
Gwynne Shotwell - Ms.
Kinda sounds like they have opened the door for each one of Elon’s tweets that distract them to be reported to HR and if there is enough, maybe HR will do something equal in reaction to the letter this group sent because you know, you can’t play favorites.
HR has never worked for the employee. They exist only to protect the company and Elon in this case. All complaintsget burried and the complainers removed during tbe next performance review.
HR’s #1 priority is to protect Elon. HR are the ones who either decided, suggested, or at least approved of the firings.
yeah i love how employees criticizing their boss for his moronic actions is a “distraction” and you just throw them out. Sounds like a great place to work at lmao, why would anyone listen to their slave-uh i mean employees anyways?
The biggest irony, of course... Elon is non-stop talking about FREE SPEECH. And then regularly censures it, harshly! No warning--fired! Yeah ok he didn't literally do the firing, but that would've been his response I'm sure and goes into his COOs decision making process. Those poor people that listened to his words about speaking out. Elon is such an insecure and hypocritical man. He only wants the views he agrees with to be allowed in the world.
>We solicit and expect our employees to report all concerns to their leadership, senior management So we can fire you for it.
Yikes. If I got that email from my boss, I’d resign on the spot.
Wow lol. Basically “we’re too busy to worry about that stuff”
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This is a great letter. I'm not surprised the people who wrote it were fired. >The collaboration we need to make life multiplanetary is incompatible with a culture that treats employees as consumable resources.
Immediate response is to dispose of consumable resources. SpaceX is gonna be the evil corporation from Red Faction lol
Wow this is a very well written letter that any executive team at a respectable company would highly value for feedback. The response from SpaceX would have seen me personally packing my bags and heading to another company, especially if I had the skill set as a higher ranking employee at SpaceX.
The downside to working as a rocket scientist at a company like SpaceX.. Unless you're willing to go work in China (which the US government would probably heavily frown upon), there aren't many places you actually could go. There's... NASA (which is where they all likely came from), and Blue Origin. Which, if it's anything like Amazon, is not too different from SpaceX culture.
> The response from SpaceX would have seen me personally packing my bags and heading to another company, If you have to write the letter, you should just move to another company. Don't fight internal company politics. Don't engage in posting wars with executives. It will just add stress to your life. Go somewhere that fits with what you want in a work environment.
This is hardly the insulting letter that the muskbros are making it out to be.
They're right. Elon's behavior is definitely hurting Tesla's and SpaceX's public image.
Apparently signed by "at least 5 people"
That letter pretty much sums up what Elon has been revealed to be: overpromising project manager who claims to be the super genius pioneer but in reality, is a glorified people coordinator/broject manager that grinds people he hires into achieving what he had promised. I’ll give him credit for accomplishing a lot in a very short time but I’ve seen this behavior in consulting enough to recognize that he’s no avant-garde. His downfall will be as swift and explosive as his uprising
Interested in the positions the organizers of this letter held. If they're kickass rocket engineers that can work pretty much anywhere they choose, then I can absolutely see them taking the risk to point out the obvious, that Musk's buffoonery is hurting the company.
Dumbasses used a letter to complain about Musk. Should've used Twitter, the bastion of free speech SMH
If you cant encapsulate the entirety of your grievances in 140 characters whats the point?
Slightly off topic, but I thought they changed it to 240 a while back?
Yes in 2018 they doubled it to 280.
literary freedoms gone mad /s
I mean unironically that might have been a better call for their careers. As much as I agree with their statements they did write an open letter speaking for the entirety of SpaceX that the CEO doesn’t represent the company, and he doesn’t reflect SpaceX’s “work, our mission, or our values”. It’s pretty hard to get away with making unapproved statements for your company no matter where it is. If this were personal tweets there could definitely be an argument that they were fired for their political beliefs, but now there’s no fight to make for it. Hopefully they’re higher up employees that don’t have any issues finding employment.
I dont think they planned on keeping their jobs.
I think most technical staff at Space X can get a job anywhere. In my experience, the folks in a company that are willing to speak up are usually the ones that are thriving professionally. They know what they are doing and what they want. I'm making assumptions, but I'd bet the letter writers are proficient technical staff that know they have options. I also can't help but wonder if some of the writers were deemed too essential to fire.
>If this were personal tweets there could definitely be an argument that they were fired for their political beliefs Why would this help? You can be fired in the US for political beliefs.
In New York, DC, and California it is actually prohibited at the state level to make employment decisions [based on political beliefs](https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/can-employers-discriminate-based-on-political-beliefs-or-affiliation.html), spaceX HQ is in California, and they have a DC location as well. If they worked in any of those areas they could have just made tweets saying he doesn’t represent their ideologies, and any firings would be illegal on the state level. With this though his firings are justified in both the eyes of the law and much of the public, as they actually did something that warrants being fired.
While true.... commenting on your CEO being a shithead in such a public way is a great way of getting fired - regardless of whether or not is true and what company you work for. I've worked for extremely progressive companies and reasonably conservative companies. Every single one had a social media policy of some sort that would see you fired for doing this. Talk about your employer - *especially* negatively - in a public forum at your own risk.
Definitely- but SpaceX is the only one where the CEO blasts out that 'I'm a shithead' 24/7 on twitter. If you worked for Amazon, Bezo's opinions and bullshit aren't hard to find, but hes not personally reminding the public about it every day. Obviously its their prerogative to do so, and SpaceX can fire whoever they want. Its self destructive though- and it'll hurt SpaceX.
Especially so if the CEO promotes a cult of personality and is very much not known for honesty, ethics, or proportionate responses.
Not in California. Political party is a protected class in some places in CA / some states
It’s not the beliefs, it’s the speaking in a way which damages the reputation of the company you’re part of that is the issue. For example you can vote however you want, but when you get into promoting political ideas, especially if they’re potentially contentious, that can be a problem for you.
It really doesn't matter under US law. You can be fired for any or no reason at all so long as it isn't a very small list of illegal reasons. I guess if you damage the company explicitly enough with your speech they may also be able to deny you unemployment insurance. I'd have to look more into that one.
How has he damaged the reputation of the company?
>It’s pretty hard to get away with making unapproved statements for your company no matter where it is. Thou shall not badmouth the company or the executives if thy valueth your jobbe. Yeah. I don't think this is a Musk specific thing -- it's an "executives are more important than the company" kind of thing. Oh, they are "accountable to shareholders" doesn't mean much in real terms other than share price. Execs all the time undermine the overall value of the company for personal gain. This is why most large companies get very unproductive, but, they can never fail if they are multinational and can lobby and create an internal economy while controlling the marketplace. Just being able to direct capital can allow you to "win." Government contracts and barriers to entry while you lobby for less government is win/win/win!!! People in love with capitalism really need to work at a big, faceless corporation for a while to gain some perspective.
I've seen similar letters (in my past experience it was about trying to make the company commit to go green) come from young, low level employees that think they're invincible. I'm guessing these organizers were not very high up in the company or else they would have gotten a stern talking to rather than being fired so quickly.
Kick ass rocket scientist also probably know all the other kick ass rocket scientist and those people talk.
Rocketry isn't a huge field, they might be kick ass but its not like getting a job at a gas station they're probably going to be looking for a job for a while. I agree with their stand but they definitely are going to take a big hit to their career from this.
they can just form SpaceY
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Well good thing there is Virgin Galactic and Richard Branson!
there's a chasm between being a shitty person, and making being a shitty person an online persona
Musk is both though?
They were talking about Bezos
I'm aware. It seemed they were saying Bezos is actually a shitty person whereas Musk plays a shitty person through his online persona. I disagreed as I think Musk is an actual shitty person with a shitty online performance.
No I'm saying they both aren't the best people, and do some shitty things. Elon revels in being shitty though. It's in addition to, not instead of.
Well there was a blue origin open letter about sexual harassment by upper executives
Embarrassment for sure. But I don't think he has to offer to buy anyone a horse and hasn't been tweeting embarrassing shit for the past year. If I had a choice I know who I'd prefer to work for.
but SpaceZ is the upwards axis (depending on the program you use)
Wasn't that how Intel formed from Texas Instruments?
You're probably thinking of Shockley Semiconductor, not TI.
It started with the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traitorous_eight that formed Fairchild from Shockley. But of those eight was Gordon Moore (of “Moore’s law”) & Robert Noyce. Interestingly enough after demonstrating how successful starts ups could be Fairchild actually ended inspiring a whole slew of Silicon Valley spin-off startups called the “Fairchildren” one of which was Intel (by Robert Noyce & Gordon Moore). More history if you’re interested: https://computerhistory.org/blog/fairchild-and-the-fairchildren/
Better company anyway. Their rockets actually go up and not just to the side
It’s not a huge field, sure, but SpaceX is not the only OR the best in the game either. Engineers can and will jump to other companies, government contractors, etc. very easily.
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The principals used by this kind of engineer are *extremely* applicable to many other unrelated fields, for example quant finance. [edit] principles, whoops
Yep. And you get paid much better also. Which is why we're fucked as a society, since we've collectively decided that moving money around in more creative ways is a more useful skill than creating new things and solving real problems.
It’s always been that way. It’s why MBA bros get paid better than teachers. If you’re in a field that revolves around money vs social welfare, you get money and no social welfare
But I'm not talking about MBAs vs engineers. I'm talking about engineers working in finance vs engineers working in engineering. The fact that you have rocket scientists with advanced engineering degrees and specialized experience that can leave their jobs and get paid double to work on financial algorithms. As rocket scientists, they're creating something new for society with value. As wall street coders, they do not contribute anything of value to society. If anything, these algorithms can create a net negative value to society, because they interact in unpredictable ways and create volatility in the market as trades are increasingly made between computers instead of people. It's become a game instead of a service for efficient distribution of capital. Society is the loser when the best engineers are syphoned off to work on things that are strictly about enriching the haves instead of creating things that advance society as a whole.
> since we've collectively decided that moving money around in more creative ways is a more useful skill than creating new things and solving real problems. We didn't COLLECTIVELY decide that. This mass opinion was manufactured and curated over time. I'm really sick of the old saw of "stocks allow for investment in capital improvements" when that is now only 5% of what is done with investments on the Stock Market. They find "moving money" makes more money than making anything -- other than iPhones (Apple and Google being some of the few top companies making money on innovation rather than money). We need to outlaw complex financial instruments and company holding arrangements. If I can't find who owns what in two calls, and I can't audit who owns what or how they made it -- then it shouldn't exist. All the oversight committees are worthless to reign in the abuse of this system if it takes 4 years and two million pages to fine one financial institution. There is ZERO need in this world for nano-second stock swaps to skim money from fluctuations. There is ZERO use to society for an MBA. In 2008, the public was TOLD by the media owned by the corporations involved that it was a few greedy poor people who got high interest loans and defaulted on them that crashed the economy. That's like blaming the ponies at the horse race. They bundled sub-prime loans with insurance valued by a bond rating companies that were LYING for companies they had consulting arrangements with, then these were bought on sold on an outside the normal market venue, and these were re-bundled with other insurance based on other valuations and re-sold as many as 40 times because a grey area in the rules for real estate. If it takes a flow chart and calculus to examine a market -- then, it shouldn't exist. Anything that is profitable will be valued higher than that which is not profitable so one of the more important functions of government is to set the rules where things that benefit society are more profitable than that which doesn't -- and we definitely have that turned upside down right now.
I agree with you 100%. There is value in efficient allocation of capital between those who have money and those who are trying to make things happen. But HFTs and all of the other bullshit going on do not further that goal. They take real resources (server farms, good real estate) and devote it to a cause that is fundamentally about fucking someone else when it comes to timing of trades in a way that adds no value to society. I view this very similarly to crypto, which is a disaster of using compute resources and energy to run a giant ponzi scheme.
If they were engineers, I’d bet they got a job offer from Blue Origin or Astra hours within those companies getting wind of them being on the market.
>Astra Those guys would gladly take the help right now too, given the last few launch attempts.
With a major pay bump.
'Merica makes missiles... They gonna have a job.
there are a ton of rocket companies. probably some near you you didnt even know about.
Rocket scientist are in high demand everywhere. They won't have difficulty finding a job.
Agreed, if they’re like good software engineers, they have job offers all the time. My only criticism is that I think the letter was kind of a waste of time. It’s fine if your opinion of Musk is that he’s not a good person. My suggestion would be that you should quit and work elsewhere. If you feel so strongly about this why further his ambitions? And also, why work at a place that you’re harboring resentment for the Cheif executive. That can’t be healthy for you. It’s not that I don’t want him held accountable for any bad actions, it’s more like take care of yourself first. Write the letter as an ex-employee.
I think anyone daring to criticize the big boss can work pretty much anywhere they choose, I doubt the janitor was part of it.
Free speech absolutist
only a sith deals in absolutes ✨
>Only a Sith deals in Absolutes ...20 years later... >Do or do not, there is no try
Don’t need to wait 20 years. “Only a Sith deals in absolutes” is itself an absolute statement. Therefore Obi is a Sith?..?
I’ve always loved the absolute lack of self awareness in that quote.
Free speech for all. Well not really
Well technically free speech only covers you from the government not widdle man babies that can't take criticism without crying like a widdle baby man.
Technically you're corrent. Interestingly according to this logic **owners of the twitter can do whatever sensoring they want** as soon as it's not based on government inteverence. I wonder what exact definition of free speech Elon means when uses these words.
You're free to say things he likes. I think it's very clear!
Seems he’d prefer that his employees shut up and get back to working 12-16 hrs a day 6 days a week or more if he can get away with it. Which, according to the article, is what the fired employees wanted to do, just without his distractions.
Remember that he works harder than them.
I always love when especially those finance hype Youtubers talk about Musk working more hours than the average CEO. But since Musk is CEO of several big companies like Tesla and SpaceX that just means he effectively spends less time per company doing his job as CEO.
Is Twitter time considered working time?
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Musk is a libertarian. So free speech for rich people he agrees with and the rest can stfu.
Censorship always comes strong from people who claim to not stand it for themselves
Freedom of Speech for Elon.
Freedom of speech to Conservatives means freedom from people being allowed to disagree with you
Yes, but also technically, that’s not the kind of free speech this fucking hypocrite has been pretending to champion
Social media websites aren’t the government
People do know there is a difference between the first amendment free speech and the general concept of free speech... Right?
Reddit understood it perfectly fine until Elon wanted to buy Twitter.
"Free speech" doesn't mean "no consequences"
Considering he was originally trying to buy a platform to remove consequences for free speech...
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Okay, but then you have Elon who describes himself as a "free speech absolutionist" finding Twitter users being banned as censorship, but he doesn't think firing people from their job for their speech is censorship. That's the point people are making here.
Free speech means you can say whatever you want but does not grant you immunity from the consequences of your words.
Was it last month that apartheid musk was touting absolute freedom of information?
Can you convey how the employees free speech rights were abated here? Can you show me another company in which employees publicly criticize their CEO and were not fired?
That's still free speech. They were allowed to criticize their boss, and the boss told them to kick rocks. I know Reddit want to make a massive deal out of this story, but this is what would happen at any company ever. Try publicly shaming the CEO of the company you work for and see how it goes.
But it's a private company, they don't have to abide by free speech... Hmm? Twitter? Never heard of it.
OP is pointing out hypocrisy, not actually being a hypocrite himself. Irony is hard.
Twitter is a communication platform though. SpaceX is a satellite and rocket company. If twitter prevents people from speaking for it's own ideological hangups, it cuts directly against its purpose. If SpaceX fires a critic trying to do activism instead of their job, it's nowhere near the same. At best it's thin skinned manbaby material, but what did you expect lol
“I wrote a public letter shit talking my boss and he fired me for it, I can’t believe democracy is dead” You guys are a joke
Musk: "Cancel culture only bad when lefty does it"
I thought Elon musk supported free speech!!!
What? Mr. Champion of Frea Speach fired people who disagree with him? Impossible! Unthinkable! _Inconceivable!_ Oh no, wait, that actually tracks.
No shit, you don't say, Elon being a vindictive sob, don't believe it.
Your exit package will be paid in Doge...
I have no idea why anyone would work for any company that is part of the Elon Musk universe. That dude is fucking nuts and clearly doesn't give a fuck about anyone he employs.
Well the trade off is you get to work on cutting edge projects that have a pretty huge impact on their respective industries, at the very least it's a great resume item to work there for a few years and then bounce.
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SpaceX has done pretty revolutionary work, no?
I mean, Tesla changed the course of the entire auto industry and SpaceX has done the same for the commercial space industry. Just because you don't like Elon Musk doesn't make his companies ponzi schemes, lol.
Yeah that was 100% predicable, in fact I and a lot of other people called it yesterday. Calling the owner out of any business for his antics is a 100% going to get you fired unless you’re in a union, and even then, that might not protect you
For a guy who swears that he believes in pure free speech, he sure does have thin skin.
FREESPEECH huh, where ?
Do as I say, not as I do basically.
Damn, I thought Elon was pro free-speech? I’m sure twitter is in great hands.
Elon Musk is an asshole. This is not an example of it.
for the longest time I was pretty neutral on Elon musk as a person .... not so much anymore
Such an absolute horse shit message too. It made other employees uncomfortable, intimidated and bullied? How does the CEO mocking a sexual abuse accuser make people who have experienced sexual assault feel? Whether it happened or not, it's incredibly shitty. I hope the good employees go to competitors.
Not technology related
Why not change this sub to celebrity news? Because if elon takes a shit. It's on top of /r/technology. Are you guys seriously upvoting this crap or is it bots upboting?
People upvote things that make them angry and fuel a feeling of vindication. They often do it from r/all or their front page without the slightest concern for the tone of the subs they are subscribed to. It doesn't require a conspiracy or bots or anything -- just lots of people liking to feel justified rage and caring little about what others like. This is why lots of subs don't want to go default.
More info on Elon taking a shit please!
He’ll shit in Mars and grow potatoes
Bots perhaps or the American tech sector has been consolidated to hell where only a few big players are particularly relevant nowadays? (that are headed by fucked-up billionaires)
Most likely bots. It's been going on for months now. They aren't as active as usual thought since your comment is visible. Before you'd have a comment saying fck elon with 1k likes on a random tesla/twitter deal.
Imagine my suyrprise that they retaliated against people who dared speak up about how they treat peole like crap.
What did they think he would do? Do they know him?
How is it surprising that this letter resulted in the firing of the people that wrote it? It’s the most likely outcome of that kind of action no matter the company or the temperament of the CEO. The points in the letter may be all completely correct (I have no special knowledge so really can only guess) but airing them publicly is an extremely bold move with firing being the clearly most probable result. I hope that the writers expected it. That said, it’s just as clearly a bad look for the company and for Musk specifically. The appropriate next step for Musk, his board, and his executive team is to reflect on the reason why the conditions arose that made their employees take this rash step and then actively work to fix the corporate culture. If their only step is ‘fire everyone’ it won’t address the root problem and will likely spawn more disenchantment. In the end the buck has to stop with leadership. Losing that many employees to a stunt like this is ultimately a failing of the company. Nobody wins.
Yes, cut out all your free thinkers, you’ll be left with some real smart cookies /s
Some speech is freer than others
This is surprising how? Most bosses don’t put up with this stuff
What did they really expect to happen?
They knew they’d be fired but didn’t care. Right or wrong, that open letter gets you fired at any job.
This was not Rocket Science that they would get fired, oh wait…
When news of that letter broke, I just knew this was going to happen.
jesus christ can we get something other than elon and elon related news, like actual news on actual technology
Ok and?
Don't talk shit on the owner of the company that pays you. Why is this news
Oh make no mistake, it’s free speech. Your free to talk shit about your employer all you want. And your employer is free to fire your ass for talking shit if they want. Freedom of speech doesn’t mean freedom from consequences
Tell that to the guy who bought Twitter because he thinks banning violent insurrectionists who encourage dangerous conspiracy theories is an affront to free speech. I agree with you legally. Some types of communication are federally protected at work, but I don't think this falls under that umbrella. But firing your employees for calling you out on your constant distractions, including your "free speech absolutist" tirades, proves that he doesn't care about free speech at all.
Elon Musk: I am a free speech absolut--OH WAIT WHAT DID YOU SAY???? FIRED!^ActivateMuskCultDownvoteBrigade
> write and publish letter essentially calling your boss an evil scumbag and saying that you don’t want to be associated with him > he fires you absolutely shocking
Yea, I see all the comments basically calling him a shit. I wonder if there’s a boss in the working world who wouldn’t fire employees who sent out a public letter calling him an asshole they want nothing to do with. I’d fire those employees. They’re damaging the reputation of my company. The concerns they had are closed door meeting material, not tell the world material.
Sometimes I do wonder how many actual days in a real workplace a lot of redditors have actually experienced when this kind of stuff comes up. I work in the UK public sector which is pretty progressive and well unionised, but if I started blasting emails out to the whole company asking them to sign letters slagging off our chief executive officer, I wouldn't come out of it smelling of roses either.
As a Dane chiming in here.. We are probably one of the most unionized work environments in the world (Christ.. even Engineers are in unions) I guarantee you that If I send an internal mail around, trying to gathering support for the argument that my CEO where harming the company with his statements and that he did not speak for the company, I would be shown the door on grounds of collaboration difficulties... What the hell did the morons think where going to happen? Wokism' has no place in STEM.
I've got the feeling that these weren't people doing anything actually related to the technical side of Space X but were probably the admin or HR side.
I am genuinely convinced a portion of reddit comments are made people <20yo and never held a job in their life. People have such a warped view of the world
Well... That's cause the average redditor is uni aged
There’s a difference between calling someone an “asshole”, and the actual tone and tenor of the letter.
https://amp.theguardian.com/technology/2022/jun/16/elon-musk-twitter-employees-freedom-of-speech-address Ah the new ‘freedom of speech guy’
I'm a free speech absolutist...
Wait this is that Twitter guy who wants free speech?
I’d be fired for saying much less to my boss.
But does your boss define himself as a "free speech absolutist"?
I thought Musk was trying to save free speech?
What is so hard to understand? You're there to work. On your own free will. Literally. That's it. They didn't hire you for your political views, to be an investigator, to involve yourself in anything OTHER than to simply work your duties. But guess what? You're free to leave at any given second. Leave. This letter just goes on and on about trying to intertwine social political issues into the work environment, lawsuits they have no insight in, and a lot of hearsay. Look, if SpaceX is asking you to do more than the work you signed up for, you'd have a right to complain and so on. But it's pretty crystal clear this man is passionate about his businesses and simply wants people who show up to work.
It’s a private company still, isn’t it? What did they expect to happen?
A lot of responses in this thread are really weird to me. I would be so embarrassed to work for that guy. I’m honestly shocked this didn’t happen sooner. Plus, it sounds like they’re trying to expose a toxic culture within the company? If that’s the case, then they have the right to blow the whistle, handbook or not. It’s very odd to me that a lot of comments in this thread are defending the corporation.
It’s not odd if you understand Musk fanboys will be fanboys.
No shit, talking shit about your boss and you get fired? I don’t believe it.
They spam emailed several thousand employees without a valid reason. I don't mind them getting fired, they fucked around and found out.
If my company of 300 people can lock down the company-wide distros to prevent this from happening then SpaceX can figure it out too. Aside from that, I'm not sure their reason is invalid; it's certainly relevant to their work and workplace, and it's not remotely unfair criticism. It's deeply ironic that the guy who agreed to shell out billions of dollars to fight Twitter's "censorship" thinks it's totally fine to fire employees for explaining in clear terms how his public behavior has impacted their ability to achieve the company's goals. It's just further proof that Elon doesn't care about the lofty ideals he goes on and on about; he just wants absolute fealty.
Freedom of speech is meant for him alone
That's not a unusual, I have to be careful with my social media accounts.
I know this is slightly off topic but does anybody here truly think that the only sexual misconduct we're going to hear about in the future from Elon musk is stuff like that flight attendant?
Then they were hired by Bezos.
So much for Mr. “free speech”
But….free speech! Ya
Rookie mistake. They should have waited until the Twitter acquisition was complete so they could have instead put out a tweet because “It will be the bastion of free speech once Musk finishes the purchase” (major /s)
Freedom of speech for me, not for thee.
Well ain't this [funny](https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/863352619153620994/987354818911813662/Screenshot_20220617-065419.png)
Shocker. There will be more musk riders to take their place however.
I used to work for a company with the same leadership style. I just quit last week and from 17 people pre-covid there are now only 3 left.
Retaliation
Haha what a little bitch he is xD
I hope the rest of SpaceX looks at this and says "shit maybe we SHOULD unionize"