Contesto:
Sull’importanza di lavorare per un’azienda che aspira a realizzare qualcosa di mai provato prima, anche se facessi l’inserviente o il barista.
UndeadDancer
•6 mesi fa
"The baristas at SpaceX have this attitude as well. To be fair, fueling the engineers and techs is a really important part of the cycle to keep those hours going.
I dont miss the hours, or the pace. I do miss the excitement and understanding of how my job fit into the whole. We’d get to watch the launches live.
I think its the PR team that did it. The cameras on the rockets, mission control open and visible to everyone working.
When I start feeling imposter syndrome, or feeling down, or like I dont deserve where Ive gotten… all those types of feelings… I just go re-watch the first successful landing and remember what it felt like being there, in that moment. The video doesn’t do that feeling justice. While I had just started at that point and didn’t work on that rocket specifically, the Team atmosphere was like nothing I have ever encountered since.
Or I watch the Falcon Heavy demo… which did have boosters I worked on.
Then I regain my confidence, and go kick more ass.
None of that had anything to do with Elon Musk, but other people like Gwen Shotwell at the high levels.
We had a mission and a purpose.
I also turned down a permanent job there not once, but twice, after I ended my contract (whole different story)."
Altri aneddoti/pareri:
"Launch day. Successful mission, launch and landing. I went out to grab dinner after work at a chain restaurant while still wearing one of the SpaceX t-shirts. As I was being seated, I passed by a table where another employee and their girlfriend were already seated (as seen by his SpaceX t-shirt). As I passed by, we acknowledged one another, he held up his hand for a high-five, I high-five him for the successful launch previously that day, and move on to my table.
I have no idea which cell he worked in, or what he did, or what his name was. I’m fairly recognizable as there are not a lot of red-headed women at SpaceX, so I did stand out. He may or may not have recognized me, or even knew who I was. Yet in that moment, even outside of work, the pride and passion of another successful launch was still infectious.
As I’ve said, I was a contractor. I actually lived in Arizona and commuted every other weekend back home (sometimes every week). I was a single mom with 3 teenagers ages 16-18 at the time. It was supposed to only be a 3-month contract.
3 months, turned into 6, then a year, then a year and a half eventually.
At about the year mark I was really depressed, missing my kids, my home, my bed, my family, tired of the drive between Hawthorne and Phoenix.
One morning, I walked in, grabbed my chai from the baristas (free), a fruit cup from the cafeteria (free), watched the live feed in mission control from SpaceX being docked to the ISS during one of the resupply missions, and then walked to my station.
I got to my station, clocked in to the intranet, and read today’s internal news (paraphrased):
We are requesting any and all suggestions you have, no matter how silly, simple, or insane they are on how to: land on Mars, live on Mars, and return to Earth. Here is a link to the suggestion box.
Then I turned to work on (test) a prototype of the raptor engine that would be used to land on Mars.
It was so surreal that moment.
That’s how I lasted another six months.“”