An open letter to SpaceX decrying CEO Elon Musk’s recent behavior has sparked open discussion among the company’s employees in an internal chat system. Employees are being encouraged to sign onto the letter’s suggestions, either publicly or anonymously, with a signed version of the letter to be delivered to the desk of SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell.
The letter, reviewed by The Verge, describes how Musk’s actions and the recent allegations of sexual harassment against him are negatively affecting SpaceX’s reputation. The document claims that employees “across the spectra of gender, ethnicity, seniority, and technical roles have collaborated on” writing the letter. It’s not known which SpaceX employees wrote the letter; the employees who posted the letter in the internal chat system have not responded to requests for comment.
“Elon’s behavior in the public sphere is a frequent source of distraction and embarrassment for us, particularly in recent weeks,” the letter states. “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.”
Musk has been doing a lot recently, and his presence on Twitter can be particularly crass. In April, he shared an image of Bill Gates and an emoji of a pregnant man, captioned with “in case u need to lose a boner fast.” Last year, he also responded to a tweet about Jeff Bezos’ aerospace company Blue Origin, saying “Can’t get it up (to orbit) lol.” Musk is also currently attempting to buy Twitter.
Shared on Wednesday in an internal SpaceX Microsoft Teams channel with more than 2,600 employees, the letter argues that the company is not living up to its oft-stated “No Asshole” policy and its zero-tolerance sexual harassment policy. The document goes on to suggest three different “action items” to address the situation: SpaceX should “publicly address and condemn Elon’s harmful Twitter behavior”; the company should “hold all leadership equally accountable” for bad behavior; and SpaceX needs to “clearly define what exactly is intended by SpaceX’s ‘no-asshole’ and ‘zero tolerance’ policies and enforce them consistently.”
The number of signatures was not immediately available, but employees were asked to sign onto the letter by filling out a survey or scanning a QR code. The letter generated more than a hundred comments in the Teams channel, with many employees agreeing to the spirit of the missive, according to screenshots of the chat shared by two sources who spoke with The Verge and asked to remain anonymous. Some commenters also claimed to be embarrassed by Musk’s behavior. Others expressed a desire for the company to better address executive leadership behavior as well as sexual harassment complaints.
The letter comes nearly a month after a report from Insider alleged that SpaceX paid a former company flight attendant a $250,000 settlement after she accused Musk of exposing himself to her and propositioning her during a massage, an allegation that involved Musk offering to buy her a horse. Musk denied the allegations, telling Insider there is “a lot more to this story.”
“If I were inclined to engage in sexual harassment, this is unlikely to be the first time in my entire 30-year career that it comes to light,” he told the outlet. On Twitter, Musk joked about the story in a tweet reply: “Hi Chad, long time no see! Fine, if you touch my wiener, you can have a horse.”
After the story came out, Shotwell sent a company-wide email to SpaceX employees defending Musk. “Personally, I believe the allegations to be false; not because I work for Elon, but because I have worked closely with him for 20 years and never seen nor heard anything resembling these allegations,” Shotwell wrote. “Anyone who knows Elon like I do, knows he would never conduct or condone this alleged inappropriate behavior.”
This isn’t the first time that the topic of sexual harassment at SpaceX has surfaced. In December, a former SpaceX employee wrote an essay on the platform Lioness detailing her experience with what she described as pervasive sexual harassment at the company. She also criticized SpaceX’s HR response to her complaints. The Verge spoke with four additional former SpaceX employees at the time, all of whom argued that the company’s HR department improperly handled harassment complaints. Before the story came out, Shotwell emailed the company reiterating the “No Asshole” policy.
“We also know we can always do better,” Shotwell wrote in December. “That is why HR has been soliciting feedback from groups across the company to ensure the process is effective. HR will also conduct an internal audit, followed by a third-party audit,” VERGE reports.
