Ethically, if you do not agree with the company you work at, the optimal course of action if you can stomach it is to stay and do a bad job rather than get replaced by someone who might do a good job.

I have been in such a situation before, and while I was not able to coast along until the company went under, the time delta between me getting fired and the company going under was measured in weeks.

In hindsight I'd probably not do it again, it was hugely mentally taxing, and knowingly performing work in such a way that it provides negative value to the company (remember, the goal is to make it go under) is in my experience actually harder than just doing a good job... Especially if being covert is a goal.

IMO, this is a good question and deserves a solid answer, so I’ll do my best.

Setting aside the “fixer” for the time being, I really enjoyed the work I did at Tesla. Tesla was the first company that gave me very high levels of autonomy to just own projects and deliver. It also pushed me to take on projects that I had previously wanted to do that I hadn’t been given a chance to work on before.

(Side note: At that point in time in my career, my thinking was that I needed to earn opportunities to work on projects at work to build skills that would enhance my career. I didn’t see the value in working on projects outside of work to build skills because I didn’t think those side-project skills would be valued by other companies the same as “day job” experience. I’ve since learned this isn’t true when it’s done right.)

I spent a lot of time at Tesla delivering value for a bunch of people who desperately needed it at the time, and the thanks I received from them was genuine. It felt very good to help others at Tesla out in a meaningful way, so I kept chugging along to the best of my abilities. Life was throwing lemons at me in my personal dealings, and Tesla was helping me make lemonade from a career standpoint. Besides, all the long work hours were a good distraction from the home life stuff.

In a lot of ways, it was a very fulfilling environment to work in, but it wasn’t for the faint of heart. People often quit within a month or two because the environment was too fast paced with too many projects under tight deadlines and projects quickly followed one after another. An environment like Tesla just doesn’t let up, so one has to figure out how to manage the stress without much support from others. Oftentimes, if you do need to let up at Tesla (or introduce friction in any sort of seemingly non-constructive way), that’s the cue you aren’t working out for the company anymore and it’s time to find someone to replace you.

Coming back around to the original question of why I stuck it out until the end. Just before the “fixer” was brought in, I was “soft promoted” by a director (no title change, but was given direct reports and a pay bump, the title change was suppose to come a couple of months later as the soft-promotion happened just before an annual review cycle). The director who soft-promoted me was someone who I got along with well and it seemed like things were going in the right direction in my career at that point. The director was in charge of a couple of projects that went sideways in a very visible way, and Elon basically fired the director after the second project went south, which is why the “fixer” was brought in.

When the “fixer” first took over things, it seemed like I was going to continue on the path that the director had originally laid out for me. The “fixer” said I was going to get more headcount and work on bigger projects, but this never materialized.

I really didn’t like working for the “fixer” after a while. IMO, it was clear they didn’t know what they were doing, they weren’t willing to listen to feedback, and I spent a lot of time trying to provide guidance to the “fixer”, but it wasn’t seen as helpful and I felt like I was spinning gears. My mental health did start to suffer as I got more burned out towards the end of my tenure there.

Eventually, I was tasked with hiring someone to be my manager and I saw the writing on the wall (sort of). I started to look for a new job just in case. At one point, I thought bringing in someone between myself and the “fixer” would be a good thing. I didn’t realize I was actually finding my replacement. Two days after my replacement was hired, I was let go (this was the 1:1 meeting where I was going to turn in my notice, but HR served me papers instead).

To your original point, if I was in a similar situation now, I would be planning my exit immediately instead of trying to make the best of a bad situation, but I had to learn that lesson the hard way.

Nelson Baghetti, a.k.a. “Bag Head”

Not even Tesla fans claim that Tesla is reliable.

https://www.motor1.com/news/781164/tesla-used-car-reliabilit...

For a year when we were doing the digital nomad thing, my wife and I didn’t own a car and we rented plenty of EVs. Tesla was by far our least favorite. Not having CarPlay alone is dealbreaker

Not sure which car you compare it to specifically from those manufacturers, but teslas seem much more expensive where I live than most models of those. Comparing it to corresponding BMW would be a more appropriate comparison.

Then comparison of quality of manufacturing and driving experience would end up in very different way (as driver of even older bmw 5 series teslas I've been to feel very cheap, and driving enjoyment goes way further than straight line performance and there teslas just don't deliver).

I agree the pedodirver should have been an eye opener for everybody. People are who they are and they don't change. Circumstances change and thus corresponding reactions, but thats about it.

I think you are simplifying a little. Musk had the courage to go against the big manufacturers and build the charger network which at the same a lot of smart people would never work. Same with SpaceX. They did something most people thought could never work.

I don't like Musk politically but that doesn't mean we can't acknowledge that he transformed 2 industries by sheer willpower and stubbornness.

Teslas have a lot of flaws, but there is just now starting to be real competition. There was nothing like the model 3 in 2019. Tesla did well because they were first to market with a disruptive product people wanted, and because Elon sold it well. Both.

I did a research project of cars that actually have decent auto lane following distance keeping cruise control for my 1hr highway commute, and tried out a few in a rental cars (hyundai and kia) and a tesla model y and tesla really is the best that is out there unless you want to potentially spend a lot more to get something that comes close. A friend of mine has done many long cross country road trips no problem with just autopilot.

GM Supercruise and Ford Bluecruise are the current competition it seems, with BMW, subaru and mercedes being behind those 2. I haven't driven with them although to personally compare yet.

Even though the interior is a bit lower quality, there isn't very much quite like it on the market. It also fits an almost 7 ft surfboard inside comfortably, is a nice car to sleep in for car camping and you can get a model Y for less than $20k used now.

> the product is mediocre at best

I'm not a Tesla fanboy, last year was the first time I bought one (new Model Y), but it is by far the best car I've ever owned, and the FSD blew my mind with how much better it was than I expected.

My wife hates Elon, and has a new hybrid Mitsubishi, but she still drives my Model Y all the time because it's just so much better to drive.

What are you basing the 'mediocre' opinion on?

Seeing Elon buy Twitter was like watching a functional alcoholic I admire buy a bar.

Everyone should look up some interviews with his father, he's turning into a carbon copy.

> I think SpaceX's success is mostly down to throwing money at the problem

I'm not sure this holds true. SpaceX accomplished more with very little compared to the entire NASA budget, Boeing, etc.

I think it's much more to do with mission alignment. Run fast and lean, and approach the problem in a non-risk-adverse manner. Fail fast and often and iterate quickly.

Sure, it takes a lot of capital - but that is only a portion of the story. Look at Blue Origin/etc. in comparison.

To be considered successful, most companies need to sell more of their existing products and/or introduce new products. Tesla is doing neither – they have reduced the number of models they sell and are also selling their existing models in lower numbers.

Deliveries have been falling for the past two years.

Flat revenue for the last few years while in a market that’s otherwise growing. I don’t know if just maintaining while your competitors grow counts as “falling apart” but it isn’t good.

If you're in the market for a new X, S or Cybertruck, you're one of dozen(s)!

Still better than jira.

I assure you that all the models have such biases. Ask any LLM who caused the most death in history and you will get skinny mustache man, an opinion any historian will tell you is wrong. He is in the top 5, but not the top of the table. That was clearly biased into the models in the same way Elon biases his models. I'm not defending this behavior but I don't know how you both get models that returned the sanitized answers some want and the correct answers others want at the same time. Pure correctness probably gets you Mecha-H. Pure sanitized answers will get many wrong. Pick your poison I guess.