New Delhi: In a stern warning to employees, Tesla chief Elon Musk has asked them to return to office or leave the company. Stressing on the presence of senior workforce at the site, he asked employees to work in the office for at least 40 hours per week, according to an email Musk sent to employees on Tuesday, reported news agency Reuters.  The world’s richest man who is not convinced with the idea of his executives working from home, said "Everyone at Tesla is required to spend a minimum of 40 hours in the office per week," wrote Musk to his employees, as per the leaked mail. He clearly stated that "If you don't show up, we will assume you have resigned".


ALSO READ: Mukesh Ambani's Reliance To Acquire 40 Per Cent Stake In Italian Toy Makers' Indian Unit


Explaining his stance on physical presence, Musk wrote, "The more senior you are, the more visible must be your presence. That is why I lived in the factory so much — so that those on the line could see me working alongside them. If I had not done that, Tesla would long ago have gone bankrupt.”


Most technology firms in the Silicon Valley have still not asked workers to return to the office full-time due to resistance from some workers and a resurgence of Covid-19 cases in California. Even as Tesla has moved its headquarters to Austin, Texas, it has an engineering base and one of its factories in the San Francisco Bay area.


“There are of course companies that don't require this, but when was the last time they shipped a great new product? It's been a while," Musk said while raising objection to work from home for employees. "If there are particularly exceptional contributors for whom this is impossible, I will review and approve those exceptions directly," Musk wrote in the leaked email, as reported by Reuters.


"Tesla has and will create and actually manufacture the most exciting and meaningful products of any company on Earth. This will not happen by phoning it in."


In a response to a Twitter user who asked for “​​additional comment to people who think coming into work is an antiquated concept”, Musk wrote: “They should pretend to work somewhere else.”





Some of the workers were miffed with his decision over his latest comments in posts they mentioned on the anonymous app Blind, which requires users to log in using company email as proof of employment at firms.


"If there’s a mass exodus, how would Tesla finish projects? I don’t think investors would be happy about that," one Tesla employee wrote. “Waiting for him to backpedal real quick," another worker posted.


In an interview last month with the Financial Times, Elon Musk had praised the office goers in China and said that the Chinese workforce was burning the ‘3 am oil’ rather than the midnight oil. He even said that people in the US were avoiding going to office.