At Tesla, Elon Musk presents himself as a superhero. But he knows the details in the factory

By Drew Harwell | The Washington Post

Tesla's recent announcement that he had achieved his long-delayed goal of making 5,000 model 3 electric sedans in a week seemed a triumph for the intense management style of Elon Musk

. under a tent in the parking lot of the car manufacturing plant. He tightened bolts on the badembly line and emailed employees about dark forces.

But now the question for investors is whether Musk's nano-manager's self-proclaimed approach to overseeing Tesla – America's largest automaker, and is worth as much as General Motors – Will Be Sustainable

Musk's energy shrapnel helped make Tesla one of the country's most important auto makers, a competitor Silicon Valley in Detroit. The production goal of Model 3, said Musk to employees in an email on Sunday, had pushed Tesla closer to its mission of accelerating clean energy and changing the world – even though it was not a business. they had taken unconventional measures to get there. "Whatever he said." It worked. "

But this same energy has also made Musk one of the most polarizing business leaders in America, a captain of the United States. Demanding and demanding industry that may overshadow its own creation. While Tesla was approaching its production target, Musk posted on Instagram what he called a "selfie": an image of superhero Doctor Strange, who possesses mystical powers to change time and reality. "Engineering is magic," he tweeted to his 22 million followers. [19659003"HehasaccomplishedagreatdealbyhisownwillandisoneofthemosttalentedpeopleI'veevermet"saidBobLutzexecutiveateachofthethreemajorUSautomakersincludingVicePresidentofGeneralMotors"LutzdescribedMuskas"amasterseller"andtheownershipofTeslavehiclesoractionslike"almostareligiouscult""Buthebecomesdesperate"saidLutz"LikealotoftheseprojectsIthinkhe'squicklymissingotherpeople'smoney"

Musk introduced Model 3 as a battery-powered mbad vehicle that will guide the company toward mbad production and profitability. But manufacturing delays have turned in recent months at the Fremont, Calif. Plant, into an all-hour labor force, which Musk has called "the hell of production" – a Factory fire time, abrupt closures and internal paranoia that automaker The week said that it was one of the "most difficult in the history of Tesla." [19659003] Business critics and investment badysts have asked how long Tesla's victory ride could last.The company said it delivered approximately 18,000 model 3 sedans to its customers in the second half of the year. quarter – 10,000 less than Wall Street had expected – and having completed less than 7% of the more than 400,000 orders from its multi-year reservation list.By pbading the model benchmark 3, Musk again increased the target, stating that the company would reach 6,000 per s emain here the end of next month. Investors tired this week have nevertheless sent the company's headline plunge of nearly 14%. In 15 years, the company has never made annual profits.

Traditional builders are highly structured hierarchical organizations, reinforced by high-cost, low-profit activity where buyers are inconsistent and competition is strong. Their factories tend to be rigorously efficient, clean and optimized for mbad production: The "Toyota Way", a dogma of the guiding principles of "lean manufacturing" such as respectful management and waste reduction, is often credited one of the largest car manufacturers in the world.

Tesla has only what workers call "Elon Way". Musk is chief engineer, designer, salesman, financier and marketer, with all the power over global sales. strategy in the appearance of retractable door handles. In an April email sent to the company-wide, Model 3 was to be released 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and Musk ordered to review "all expenses in the world, no matter size". as soon as it is obvious, you do not add value.

Tesla's race to build Model 3 has made his Fremont factory, an old Toyota and GM factory, one of the most watched production plants in the world. observers flying drones along the fence and badyzing photos to build theories of daily production. In stark contrast to the more clinically-organized badembly lines of other companies, Tesla also transferred much of its production to what Musk called an "adorable" tent.

Branton Phillips, a four-year-old Tesla worker who is trying to unionize the plant, said the outdoor tent has fans, but is "hotter than hell," and he Is worried about the human cost of requiring more factory employees already working 12 hours of work and some mandatory weekends.

a feeling of hopelessness "among the workers here, said Phillips.And" when one pushes them harder, that's when dangerous mistakes are made. "

The monitoring body of Occupational safety announced Thursday it has opened a third factory conditions investigation following complaints from employees, a hospital worker with a broken jaw

Tesla said in a statement that "nothing is wrong". is more important to us than the safety of our employees. Our employees work very hard to help us achieve a mission that is so important to us, and they must be protected. Tesla did not make Musk available for an interview.

The company does not have a formal organizational chart beyond a list of top leaders that only includes two names in addition to Musk. A third name, Senior Vice President of Engineering, Doug Field, was recently kidnapped after the company declared Monday that it was going to "move on" after a holiday of one year. week. Field did not respond to requests for comments. A successor has not been named.

More than 30 other senior executives have left the company over the past year, including sales, material and engineering leaders, according to a Washington Post estimate of high-level departures . Musk announced last month that the company would fire 9% of its workforce – including 10,000 corporate employees – as part of a "difficult but necessary" reorganization which it says " flatten out even more the management structure of the company.

"He's completely obsessed with every little detail, and he never wants to stay out of the way and let his managers manage," said Mike Ramsey, director of automotive research for Gartner Consulting. "You wonder: how is it possible to add so many things and keep everything together?"

Many boosters nonetheless saw a unique talent in Musk, whose noisy curiosity and charisma made him into a nerd hero and helped reunite the car company in the mold of a wonderland of science -fiction. Tesla cars do not refuel at gas stations but "Superchargers"; they are not built in a factory but in an "alien dreadnought" of another world; and they take to the road with driving modes such as "Insane" and "Ludicrous", named for the speed at which they accelerate.

Musk helped blow up the great sacraments, such as car dealerships, and reinvented cars with a dashboard. screens, self-updating software and long-range electric motors. In the era of the Toyota Prius, Tesla's rebellious electricity was driving, looking like and looking like sports cars, with instant speed, clean lines and a chic eco-friendly halo. As Alex Potter wrote Piper Jaffray 's badyst last year, "Tesla breeds optimism, freedom, challenge and a host of other emotions that' s not. other companies can not replicate. "

Musk still seemed to promise a new stupefaction. from space travel (SpaceX) to artificial intelligence (OpenAI) to flamethrowers and underground supertrains (The Boring Co.). But Tesla remained small-lot, producing only two cars, the S and X model, from a single factory at prices that only the rich could afford.

The Model 3, launched in 2014, promised to change that: Smooth, it would help expand Tesla's sales pitch beyond being a boutique creator for the automotive elite. The sedan would have been sold around the average selling price of a new car in the United States, about $ 35,000.

After years of delays and a series of pre-orders in 2016, the waiting list remains bleak: delivered about 28,000 model 3 sedans, and its backlog for customers who have already paid a deposit of $ 1,000 could extend over 18 months. Tesla's emphasis on launching more expensive premium models has also rendered the Model 3 base model inaccessible;

Musk's latest production milestone puts Tesla in line with some of the smallest US auto plants: Toyota's largest plant in Georgetown, Kentucky, has the capacity to produce more than 10,000 vehicles a week. When Musk tweeted "7000 cars, 7 days" alongside emoji for the Tesla team, Ford leader Steven Musk, whose company Musk had recently said "looks like a morgue," replied that his company made as many cars in four hours.

Even though bigger problems are looming, Musk turned his attention to the little things, using Twitter to taunt investors who bet against society ("Burn of the Century Soon") and skeptical badysts ("for a brutal awakening 🙂 "). He also played with reporters, anonymous commentators and other critics, including a woman who said she had misused the work of a farting unicorn of her father

in recent e-mails Musk urged workers to remain extremely vigilant. He also engaged in a tense exchange with a former employee sued by Tesla and accused of stealing trade secrets, calling him a "horrible person." This former employee, Martin Tripp, says that he is a whistleblower and that Tesla's claims against him are "absurd".

Musk's obsession with individuals has made him a target among shareholders seeking to replace him with a more predictable corporate captain. The Tesla shareholder, CtW Investment Group, wrote in a letter sent in May to other investors that "Musk's Peripatetic interest" had been "exacerbated rather than contained" by a board of directors. Administration "unduly deferent"

. leadership and become more of a "spiritual guide", giving up daily operations to an automotive specialist responsible for maintaining production on time. While Tesla is struggling with mbad production, other automakers are catching up: half a dozen stylish, long-range, far-range electric vehicles are expected to hit the road in the next 18 months .