Elon Musk sent a company-wide email to Tesla staff announcing a workforce reduction of more than 10%. One laid-off Tesla worker said they moved about 6 months ago for the job before being let go.
They moved cross-country after Tesla offered them a stipend to do it. This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with a former Tesla employee who was laid off and requested anonymity to protect their privacy.
A spokesperson for Tesla did not respond to a request for comment from Business Insider. I started at Tesla as a commercial field services technician during the pandemic.
I started with the company in California and have moved twice while working for Tesla. I just moved across the country for the job six months ago.
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Tesla transferred me to one of its southern regions to service its energy department. The company needed someone in the region, and nobody had been on the ground there for over a year.
People had to fly to the area periodically to service it. Then Tesla asked me if I’d consider moving there with my wife. I called IT, and they said I needed to contact HR.
I feel like I’m doing well and receiving positive feedback from my manager. In that redundancy letter, they said the cuts were due to redundancy, but I did not feel my role was redundant.
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I feel Tesla could have handled the layoffs better. It was emotionless and sudden. Now, my husband and I feel like we’re a bit stuck.
We are in a town where I probably wouldn’t be able to find many other opportunities without having to commute about an hour and a half to work due to the rural location.
We were also away from our families and had no support system around to help us. We lost part of our safety net when we moved.
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We rented a house that was affordable on my Tesla salary, but not much now that I’m laid off. Now, we are stuck on the lease for another six months.
When we moved to Tesla, we didn’t take it lightly, but we didn’t expect it. Leaving was difficult because we lived close to family.
I have two children, a 17-year-old and a 9-year-old, and we had to uproot them. Now, I feel as if we rolled the dice and shot ourselves in the foot.
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