General Discussion: 2018 Investor Roundtable

[avoigt]

Ok, it’s time you dropped this bone. There are hundreds of companies, nay thousands that have equally bad internal broken communications and it doesn’t put them out of business. It just makes them a bit more difficult to navigate for the consumer (an employee) if you have a problem you need addressed or if you want to talk to someone specific. But anyone with a little intelligence, patience, tack and perseverance can get what they need.

Let’s just start with every company that uses foreign call centers. None of them can solve sugar for you, push system changes, or for God sakes even connect you to a born English speaking person let alone a person with any power to resolve your issue.

The ability of people to effectively communicate with each other has been a historical issue; as in since the beginning of mankind. It’s not unique to Tesla and it won’t put them out of business anymore than TMC has been put out of business because we can’t get management to make changes here we’d like to see.

All of that is particularly true if you have customers that are waiting for a product that only one company can deliver. I am not saying its good that there are issues but it currently won't matter much in the grand scheme of thinks.

Also its not an unusual problem to have for companies with superior products growing very fast. Lets not forget that Elon has set the rule that every $ they have is invested to make the product better. Having said that we should not wonder that all other processes have a lot of space for improvement.

All of that does change once you as a consumer have a real choice. After the disappointment from the EQC, e-tron and other concept as well as production releases I am still waiting for that to happen.

 

[Krugerrand]

You only need internal communication when the support systems/technical processes are non-functional. It should be the exception, not the rule.

Somebody has to put the information in and keep it up to date and fix errors in that information. How do those data entry people get the information? Why, from other people.

And some of us still like to talk to other people. It’s a quirky human trait to want to connect in that manner to others.

 

[AWDtsla]

Somebody has to put the information in and keep it up to date and fix errors in that information. How do those data entry people get the information? Why, from other people.

And some of us still like to talk to other people. It’s a quirky human trait to want to connect in that manner to others.

Yeah, we'll just tell facebook to close up shop because people would rather communicate over the phone or in person. Why not undo email at the same time.

 

[neroden]

No, actually it doesn’t. I don’t have time to write an essay and give you hundreds of exampkes in this moment.

Well, I have a long list of examples of companies killed by poor customer service and even by interdepartmental communications failures, so :shrug:

That may be the choice YOU make. Your reality is not everyone elses.

Yeah, but I'm normal in this regard.

I’ve stayed with businesses that can be very difficult to deal with for a variety of reasons.

Essentially monopoly businesses, I presume. If not,... then you're the oddball.

Most people really do not have the time or patience to spend literally *hours* being given the runaround every time they have a simple service or sales problem. I mean, most people have jobs and lives (I suppose I'm the exception). This is one reason why people don't like traditional car dealerships! Tesla's managed to actually generate experiences which are *worse* for a bunch of people than the traditional car dealer experience, and that's gotta deserve some sort of special booby prize.

*Essentially every time, it was due to communications failures.*

There's been a lot of discussion about how most customers will typically prefer what's easier or cheaper rather than going to extra effort to get a better product. And it's true.

Keeping in context here, there is only one Tesla. There will only ever be one Tesla as long as there is only ever one Elon.

Tesla's got a great head start and several moats. Demand will be fine until there are enough competitors to eliminate the ICE car market.

When there are, Tesla could find itself in the position of GM with the Japanese cars coming into the US, or AT&T when competitive long distance service appeared. ("We're the phone company -- we don't have to care" doesn't work so well when there's an alternative.)

 

[avoigt]

Blitzkrieg!

 

[neroden]

All of that is particularly true if you have customers that are waiting for a product that only one company can deliver. I am not saying its good that there are issues but it currently won't matter much in the grand scheme of thinks.

Also its not an unusual problem to have for companies with superior products growing very fast. Lets not forget that Elon has set the rule that every $ they have is invested to make the product better. Having said that we should not wonder that all other processes have a lot of space for improvement.

All of that does change once you as a consumer has a real choice. After the disappointment from the EQC, e-tron and other concept as well as production releases I am still waiting for that to happen.

Yeah, it's not happening before 2020 in cars. Probably not before 2022.

In semis... the competitors are actually more serious. They're not quite up to Tesla standards, but I'm not willing to presume that they won't be "good enough" by 2020. It's not that different from buses, which is a market Tesla has already ceded. If Tesla is true to form on communications failures, the Semi could actually be a flop.

I mean, if this happens, if Tesla is clearly outcompeted by other companies -- great for the electrification of transport. Mission accomplished! But not so great for Tesla stockholders.

 

[The Blue Owl]

Your view as an outsider is clearly an incomplete view.

Tesla's handle on the customer interface is also very incomplete, it seems. They know they've got problems, but so far they're in reactive, fire-fighting mode (hence Musk's "delivery hell" characterization).

I don't think Tesla will die today or tomorrow because of it (even @neroden gives it at least 2 years), but by all indications they've long been suffering from systemic management deficiencies. Growth pains are inevitable, and reckless growth leads to atrocious growth pains, but it's pretty clear to me that Elon's prodigious market sense, product management vision, and engineering prowess have not yet been matched by a talent for managing large assemblies people. He thinks in systems, so he can sleep for a month on the production line and fix it, but so far he hasn't applied the same focus on fixing the human system. I'm optimistic, since it can be diagnosed and fixed like any other system, but Musk has to fix his gaze on it first.

I understand why these problems exist, and they don't spell doom quite yet; Tesla just got sucked inside the tornado, while the competition still waxes lyrically in the breeze of their glorious past. But internal dysfunction can limit the rate of growth (we may, in fact, be witnessing this right now, hopefully for a short time only). After the production bottleneck was resolved, it seems the next bottleneck they are running into is the organizational one. It was there before, but it was not the main one yet; now it seems it is. The sooner they address it, the better Tesla can come into their own and claim what's theirs for the next 50 years.

 

[copyhacker]

These are problems that could be solved by 1 competent developer in a day. Don't know what the hold up is. I think at this point the employees have no idea and just quote large times to make people go away. Case in point, informed it would take up to 45 days to process unlimited supercharging referral. Just flip the ****ing bit man...

As a software developer, I hear this way too often. That bit that has to be flipped doesn't exist in isolation, it's all tangled up with thousands of lines of code built and modified over years. And I can guarantee you that no one person currently working there understands the entire system. "It can't be that hard" is the "Hold my beer" of the software industry.

That said, if Conway's law ever applied to a company, it applies to Tesla.
Conway's law - Wikipedia

 

[scaesare]

The underlying problem is that Tesla's internal communications is totally, utterly broken. Nonfunctional. Database communications replicate business logic based on face-to-face / telephone communications, and Tesla doesn't have the face-to-face / telephone communications working. Tesla's internal business logic is broken.

Tesla is incompetent at computer stuff, and they're incompetent at communications.

I've pointed out before, that you are painting with a pretty broad brush here. There are a number of areas of code implementation throughout the company, from drivetrain embedded systems, to infotainment/NAV, to datacenter/mothership, to internal business systems.

Certainly there are issues with some of those, no doubt. But I'd hesitate to say they are completely incompetent at all of the above.

What's more, I suspect that some of the problems are a result of the rapid pace of innovation and change, and business processes and systems not being able to keep pace.

So while that's certainly a problem, it's a different problem... one that you will find much more often in a Silicon Valley type startup than in a relatively stodgy Detroit business.

I also expect that means that it will be addressed differently as well.

 

[AWDtsla]

As a software developer, I hear this way too often. That bit that has to be flipped doesn't exist in isolation, it's all tangled up with thousands of lines of code built and modified over years. And I can guarantee you that no one person currently working there understands the entire system. "It can't be that hard" is the "Hold my beer" of the software industry.

That said, if Conway's law ever applied to a company, it applies to Tesla.
Conway's law - Wikipedia

Yeah, and I hear "it's too complicated" way too often too. Usually requires a demonstration to get around, then complaints then shift to the next thing. Shoving bits in and out of a database isn't that complicated. This is 2018 not 1999.

 

[copyhacker]

Yeah, and I hear "it's too complicated" way too often too. Usually requires a demonstration to get around, then complaints then shift to the next thing. Shoving bits in and out of a database isn't that complicated. This is 2018 not 1999.

What's your background? Asking out of curiosity.

 

[AWDtsla]

What's your background? Asking out of curiosity.

Same.

 

[Krugerrand]

Tesla's handle on the customer interface is also very incomplete, it seems. They know they've got problems, but so far they're in reactive, fire-fighting mode (hence Musk's "delivery hell" characterization).

I don't think Tesla will die today or tomorrow because of it (even @neroden gives it at least 2 years), but by all indications they've long been suffering from systemic management deficiencies. Growth pains are inevitable, and reckless growth leads to atrocious growth pains, but it's pretty clear to me that Elon's prodigious market sense, product management vision, and engineering prowess have not yet been matched by a talent for managing large assemblies people. He thinks in systems, so he can sleep for a month on the production line and fix it, but so far he hasn't applied the same focus on fixing the human system. I'm optimistic, since it can be diagnosed and fixed like any other system, but Musk has to fix his gaze on it first.

I understand why these problems exist, and they don't spell doom quite yet; Tesla just got sucked inside the tornado, while the competition still waxes lyrically in the breeze of their glorious past. But internal dysfunction can limit the rate of growth (we may, in fact, be witnessing this right now, hopefully for a short time only). After the production bottleneck was resolved, it seems the next bottleneck they are running into is the organizational one. It was there before, but it was not the main one yet; now it seems it is. The sooner they address it, the better Tesla can come into their own and claim what's theirs for the next 50 years.

I’ll just go with that Elon hasn’t found the right person/people for those managerial communication/talk to each other role/roles. I don’t believe it’s not for a lack of trying.

 

[neroden]

As a software developer, I hear this way too often. That bit that has to be flipped doesn't exist in isolation, it's all tangled up with thousands of lines of code built and modified over years. And I can guarantee you that no one person currently working there understands the entire system. "It can't be that hard" is the "Hold my beer" of the software industry.

That said, if Conway's law ever applied to a company, it applies to Tesla.
Conway's law - Wikipedia

Yeah. Good law! Thanks, I hadn't seen it before.

Normally, that's fine; if your corporate structure is OK, your software will reflect that, and even if it's not ideal for the task, it'll be OK.

Unfortunately Tesla's software is replicating their severely broken communications. Tesla's organizational structure is a wreck, so the software structure is a wreck. The communications is the core problem.

I could solve the communications problem by brute force. I've spent most of every day of the last several months basically just calling people and getting people to call me back (no, it wasn't all about Tesla!) Do that, get other capable people to do that, and you're going to get an idea of how the lines of communication need to be arranged. Then you'll figure out who's capable of arranging them and who isn't... but Tesla haven't started working on the problem yet. They don't even seem to *see* the problem.

Someone should be reading the Model 3 forum every day and seeing people's reactions, and that someone should have top executive authority to do restructuring.

 

[neroden]

I’ll just go with that Elon hasn’t found the right person/people for those managerial communication/talk to each other role/roles. I don’t believe it’s not for a lack of trying.

I am certain, from following the history of Tesla, that he hasn't really identified this as a need. He's made some super dumb statements (like "people should just call each other") which indicate that he doesn't see what the problem is (there's no decent org chart, nobody knows who they're supposed to call)

 

[neroden]

So Musk says they're building their own car carriers:
Tesla starts building its own car carriers due to ‘extreme shortage’ in Model 3 delivery rush week, says Elon Musk

I guess the regulations on trailers are pretty relaxed, so this is viable. Should solve *one* problem, but not the serious problem. Has Musk figured out what the serious problem is yet? I still think not.

 

[JRP3]

I wonder if they are building to an already established and approved design so certification is faster, because I'd imagine it takes a few days to build a trailer and then time to schedule a state inspection.

 

[AlMc]

To @neroden 's point about communication: Daily TSLA Trading Charts. From @madodel


They are going to have to do something about delivery communications. My wife's partner was in Boston visiting family for the weekend, but he had been told he had to pick up his Model 3 on Sunday from Devon, so even though he drove to Boston with his wife he was going to fly to Philly and then Uber to Devon for the pickup just because he has waited so long for his 3 he was afraid they'd give it to someone else. But when he called them Saturday he had to yell at them before they told him his 3 was damaged so it would be a couple more weeks before he would get his car. Someone should have called him to tell him the status of his delivery or at least have been honest when he called them before he had to escalate things. And he is someone my wife has never heard be angry or loud. This has to get fixed fast and they will soon have to start scaling up delivery service all over the world and hire competent people to work with customers.

 

[mongo]

I wonder if they are building to an already established and approved design so certification is faster, because I'd imagine it takes a few days to build a trailer and then time to schedule a state inspection.

Requirements for trailers seem to be pretty minimal. Lights, tires, VIN, placard with specs, and brakes. Heck, they could mount four post lifts on pre built flat bed or low boy trailers...

 

[Krugerrand]

To @neroden 's point about communication: Daily TSLA Trading Charts. From @madodel


They are going to have to do something about delivery communications. My wife's partner was in Boston visiting family for the weekend, but he had been told he had to pick up his Model 3 on Sunday from Devon, so even though he drove to Boston with his wife he was going to fly to Philly and then Uber to Devon for the pickup just because he has waited so long for his 3 he was afraid they'd give it to someone else. But when he called them Saturday he had to yell at them before they told him his 3 was damaged so it would be a couple more weeks before he would get his car. Someone should have called him to tell him the status of his delivery or at least have been honest when he called them before he had to escalate things. And he is someone my wife has never heard be angry or loud. This has to get fixed fast and they will soon have to start scaling up delivery service all over the world and hire competent people to work with customers.

That’s a people problem not a communication problem.

The person who knew about the car being damaged simply didn’t do their job for whatever reason; they aren’t old enough/don’t have the life experience required to be in a position of notifying people when things are not hunky dory. So a person who doesn’t know how to give bad news/deal with irate/upset customers whatever. A person passing the buck or waiting for someone else to do the hard part.