According to allegations in the media, Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, has dismissed numerous workers at his rocket ship firm SpaceX for their participation in an open letter that criticised the eccentric billionaire for his behaviour. The letter was published on Medium.com.
According to the claims that were released on Friday, an email sent by Gwynne Shotwell, the president of SpaceX, said that the business had fired workers who were responsible for putting together and distributing the message. The people who sent the letter criticised Musk for his activities, which they described as being “a regular cause of distraction and humiliation for us, especially in recent weeks.”
The New York Times was the first publication to expose the purge, and their article was based on information provided by three workers who were acquainted with the matter. The personnel were not identified by name.
It is unknown how many SpaceX employees lost their jobs, but Shotwell made it plain that the firm was of the opinion that the employees had exceeded a threshold that was unacceptable.
According to what Shotwell said in an email that was sent to the Times, “The letter, solicitations, and overall procedure made workers feel uncomfortable, intimidated and harassed, and/or outraged since the message encouraged them to sign onto something that did not represent their values.” We have much too much important work to do, and there is no need for us to engage in such far-reaching action at this time.”
The firings took place on Thursday, the same day that Musk addressed Twitter staff for the first time about his plan to add the social media site to his corporate empire for a total of USD44 billion. The acquisition is still in limbo as Musk investigates whether or not Twitter has been hiding the amount of bogus accounts that are active on its site.
As the Twitter drama played out, a separate source claimed that Musk had paid a flight attendant the equivalent of USD250,000 to prevent her from bringing a sexual harassment claim against him. Musk has refuted the charges of sexual harassment, and Shotwell has informed her other workers at SpaceX that she believes the allegations to be untrue in an email that she sent out one month ago.
In recent weeks, Musk has also bluntly insulted the appearance of Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates on Twitter. During an online chat with Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, Musk used a faeces emoji as part of their conversation.
It was argued in the public letter that workers of SpaceX sent to criticise Musk that some tweets that Musk had sent out to his 98 million followers painted a negative picture of the enterprise.
Every tweet that Elon puts out is considered to be a de facto public statement by the firm, as stated in the open letter.