'Not for the faint-hearted': Why Sreela Venkataratnam quit as Tesla VP
Elon Musk did want a lean and mean Tesla, but may not have anticipated that so many high-profile employees would quit the company
Sreela Venkataratnam spent 11 years with Tesla, and was vice president of finance and business operations. Photo: X
Tesla’s vice president of finance and business operations, Sreela Venkataratnam, has quit her job after spending 11 years with the automobile company.
She announced her resignation in a post on LinkedIn this week.
Sreela, one of the only two women vice presidents in Tesla, described her stint with the company as “nothing short of extraordinary”, but also said working there “was not for the faint of heart”.
“I joined as Director of Finance Operations in early 2013, when Tesla was a company with less than $1B in yearly revenue, a market cap of $4B, and less than 3,000 cars delivered in a year. Leaving as a Vice President (one of only two women VPs in the company) with annual revenues soaring close to $100B, market cap to $700B (reaching $1T during the pandemic) and cars delivered in a year to more than 1.8 million, I am proud of how much we’ve achieved together,” Sreela wrote in her post.
When Jason Wheeler, former CFO at Tesla, congratulated Sreela for an “amazing run at a company that wasn’t always easy to work at”, she responded that working for Tesla “is definitely not for the faint of heart”.
Not the only one to quit
Sreela is one of several senior employees to quit Tesla in the past few months.
Rohan Patel, VP of public policy and business development, and Drew Baglino, senior VP of powertrain and electrical engineering, quit Tesla just before the layoffs began in the company in April this year. Baglino had worked with Tesla for 18 years.
The head of product launches, Rich Otto, quit during the layoffs. He wrote on LinkedIn, after his departure from the company, that he loved the company that had given him so much, but it had also taken “it’s pound of flesh”.
“Great companies are made up of equal parts great people and great products, and the latter are only possible when its people are thriving. The recent layoffs that are rocking the company and its morale have thrown this harmony out of balance. It’s time for a change,” Otto wrote.
When Tesla let go of more than 10 per cent of its employees this year, Elon Musk said the company needed to be absolutely hard core about headcount and cost reduction. But Musk may not have anticipated that so many high-profile employees would quit the company.