Former SpaceX engineer essay alleges culture is ‘rife with sexism’

A feminine former worker of Elon Musk’s SpaceX alleged in an essay printed Tuesday that the area firm’s office is “rife with sexism” and that its human assets group doesn’t shield victims of harassment or abuse.

Ashley Kosak, who labored at SpaceX for about 4 years as an intern after which as an engineer, alleged in her essay on weblog web site Lioness that SpaceX’s tradition is “in a state of disrepair and dysfunction so nice that the one treatment, lastly, was to depart.” Kosak left SpaceX in November and now works for Apple.

“I do know that SpaceX is now making an attempt to enhance … what I actually hope occurs is that not solely ladies come to know how widespread this subject is but additionally their male counterparts,” Kosak informed CNBC in an interview on Tuesday. “We will proceed to attempt to truly begin holding folks accountable.”

CNBC additionally spoke with Julia CrowleyFarenga, who was a three-time intern at SpaceX and alleged her personal situations of sexual harassment and HR negligence.

CrowleyFarenga sued SpaceX for discrimination and retaliation in 2020 after not being employed. The lawsuit has since “been resolved,” CrowleyFarenga stated. She now works for the California Institute of Know-how at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

“It is actually necessary for folks to listen to these tales in order that hopefully these accountable will likely be held accountable for his or her actions,” CrowleyFarenga stated.

SpaceX didn’t reply to CNBC’s repeated requests for remark.

The corporate has about 10,000 workers throughout america, lots of whom Kosak would have frolicked round throughout her work at its headquarters in Los Angeles and its launch operations amenities in Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Kosak and CrowleyFarenga paint a distinct image of SpaceX versus the way in which the corporate seems publicly. Feminine engineers commonly host the corporate’s launch webcasts, that are seen by thousands and thousands on-line, whereas SpaceX president and COO Gwynne Shotwell has grow to be one of the highly effective ladies within the area trade.

In Musk’s interview with Time journal printed Monday, he described SpaceX’s Starship growth facility in Texas as “like a expertise monastery” and stated the corporate’s workforce is male-dominated.

“There’s hardly any — there are some ladies right here — however not many, and it is distant and we do expertise,” Musk stated within the interview.

Notably, SpaceX just isn’t alone as an area firm going through inner criticism of its tradition. Earlier this yr Lioness printed an analogous essay by Alexandra Abrams, the previous head of worker communications at Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin.

Abrams’ essay, endorsed anonymously by 20 different present and former Blue Origin workers, alleged a “poisonous” office that created a sexist surroundings. Blue Origin has had a risky yr, starting from the successes of launching 14 folks on its New Shepard rocket to the turmoil of excessive worker turnover.

Kosak began at SpaceX as an intern in 2017, earlier than the corporate employed her full time in 2019. Throughout her time as an intern, Kosak alleged, one other intern “grabbed my butt whereas I used to be washing my dishes” within the firm’s housing. She stated she reported the incident to 2 colleagues, together with a superior, however that “the matter was by no means dropped at HR” and that she continued “residing in residence with this man.”

She wrote that over the following two years as she interned for the corporate “numerous males” made “sexual advances towards me” and alleged one other incident wherein “a male colleague ran his hand over my shirt, from my decrease waist to my chest.” Kosak stated she once more reported the incident to her supervisors and this time met with HR.

“Nobody adopted up. This man remained a part of the group I reported to and labored for,” Kosak alleged.

In 2021, as a full-time worker, Kosak introduced additional “incidents of sexism to HR,” together with ones that she witnessed, she stated.

“After we needed to work at home through the pandemic, males from the corporate discovered my Instagram account, messaging me to ask me out. One referred to as my cellphone at 4:00 am. One other coworker got here to my home and insisted on touching me even after I repeatedly requested we keep skilled,” Kosak stated.

She alleged that “nothing was performed” in response to every incident she reported to HR.

“I used to be informed that issues of this nature had been too non-public to brazenly talk about with the perpetrators. As an alternative, they stated mandated firm coaching applications can be held,” Kosak stated.

Kosak stated that after extra incidents, she submitted “a message to the SpaceX nameless Ethics and Compliance tip line.” However “regardless of its marketed anonymity,” Kosak stated, “the tip line was truly a Microsoft kind that permits the admins to see the submitter’s id.”

“Every week later, I used to be contacted by HR and confronted with invasive questions relating to the character of the harassment,” Kosak stated.

Earlier than she left the corporate, Kosak stated, she met with SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell, in addition to the corporate’s head of HR.

“They assured me they’d by no means heard about my harassment experiences, and stated that executive-level management just isn’t concerned in discussions of the frequency of this subject inside their departments,” Kosak wrote.

Shotwell has beforehand stated that SpaceX has a “no a——” coverage. In a graduation handle at Northwestern College earlier this yr, Shotwell stated “a——-” are individuals who “interrupt others” and “create a hostile surroundings the place nobody desires to contribute.” However Kosak alleged in her essay that SpaceX’s tradition doesn’t observe that coverage in apply, writing that “every man who harassed me was tolerated regardless of the corporate’s so-called no-tolerance and no-a—— coverage.”

“Finally, I used to be disillusioned,” Kosak informed CNBC. “As a result of I assumed, by the point that I used to be in that assembly [with Shotwell], they might have recognized.”

CrowleyFarenga added that it is “absurd” that SpaceX management would solely lately be “listening to about sexual harassment on the firm.” She stated that she was in a ladies’s community with a mentor who would speak to Shotwell, and mentioned how a SpaceX male supervisor handled CrowleyFarenga whereas she was an intern.

“Gwynne [Shotwell] was not completely happy to listen to {that a} supervisor was spending two hours together with his intern,” CrowleyFarenga stated.

In her essay, Kosak added that “the final I heard, new SpaceX interns would obtain coaching on the best way to higher report their harassment,” however emphasised that her alleged harassers “have nonetheless not been held to account.”

Kosak stated she “created a plan that might convey SpaceX to full carbon neutrality by 2030,” partly as a result of she noticed the corporate’s tradition as being at odds with its mission of constructing humanity a multiplanetary species.

“It contained a framework for a various and purposeful society that might study from our colonial previous and incorporate indigenous experience,” Kosak wrote within the essay.

Kosak alleged that a few of SpaceX’s buildings “run on fuel mills,” saying that “funding just isn’t being devoted to lowering carbon emissions.”

“Whereas there are photo voltaic panels on campus, any makes an attempt to make new buildings and infrastructure sustainable (LEED) are deprioritized in favor of increasing the manufacturing unit as quick as potential,” Kosak stated.

Kosak wrote that she introduced her plan on to Musk however stated that he “dismissed it with an e mail that stated: ‘We’ve wind and photo voltaic vitality.'” She stated she continued engaged on her plan, with different SpaceX engineers volunteering to assist her develop it. Earlier than she stop, in November, she left “a ultimate observe to my group to proceed working towards a sustainable local weather resolution,” Kosak stated.

Musk, in a tweet hours earlier than Kosak’s essay was printed Tuesday, introduced an organization local weather undertaking.

“SpaceX is beginning a program to take CO2 out of environment & flip it into rocket gas,” Musk stated.