Unreal deadlines, no autonomy, high-level exits: Ola Electric’s work culture under scanner

A string of high-profile exits has brought Ola Electric’s work culture under the microscope and made startup veterans and management experts wonder if the company founded by Bhavish Aggarwal can really become India’s Tesla.

Unrealistic deadlines, lack of room for autonomy or opinions, and unplanned meetings well past midnight are some of the things that senior Ola Electric employees have to endure while working at the startup, according to a former senior employee who did not want to be named and squarely blamed the work culture for the management churn.

That is not good news for the company, which has lofty goals such as launching an electric car in 2023, setting up local battery cell manufacturing and going public in the future. To make things worse, it is already dealing with a host of issues including electric vehicle fires, product recalls, delayed deliveries and customers complaints about poor service. 

Also Read | Ola Electric chief says e-scooter fires rare but can happen in future

“Some companies need shallow competence while others need deep competence. Ola is moving from shallow to deep competence since its taxi service doesn’t need the same competence as its electric scooter business. In a deep competence space, rebuilding the team is crucial for the good performance of the company,” a startup veteran who spoke on condition of anonymity said, adding that such churn was “a very big red flag”. 

Ola Electric’s chief marketing officer, Varun Dubey, quit last week citing personal reasons. That came just days after the chief technology officer, Dinesh Radhakrishnan, left the startup. These departures came after other top-level exits in recent months at the Ola Group including those of Ola Cars CEO Arun Sirdeshmukh, Ola CFO Swayam Saurabh, Ola Electric’s Head of Quality Assurance Joseph Thomas and Ola Chief Operating Officer Gaurav Porwal.

The heavy churn in management could also have a “big impact” on employee morale at the group, which started its cab-aggregating business in 2010 and then forayed into electric mobility in recent years. Ola has not responded to multiple emails and calls seeking comment.

The departure of leaders often indicates turmoil within a company, loss of clear direction and could lead to a drop in team morale, according to human resource experts.

Also Read | Faulty battery cells, modules likely caused e-scooter fire in India, initial probe finds

“A very high level of sensitivity and professionalism is required to handle any high profile exit in a dignified way,” Monster.com chief executive officer Sekhar Garisa said. “Individuals graciously leaving the organisation are more likely to depict a positive picture of the brand. Further, the sense of anxiety and low motivation levels in the immediate team of the departing leader is to be addressed by the remaining leaders with a proactive, empathic and reassuring manner.”

Some blamed the management churn on lack of room for autonomy and other issues.

“A top-level management churn happens when there is a lack of cultural fitness and autonomy to perform, and a mismatch of expectations,” said a professor of operational behaviour from a reputed B-school in India.

And this seems to be the case with Ola.

“For instance, when the company was gearing up for the rollout of Ola e-scooters after pulling ahead (the) deadline by some time, Bhavish Aggarwal further cut the deadline by two to three more months,” the former employee told DH. While the top engineers were focused on delivering a strong product despite the earlier deadline, “once the deadline was cut further, we knew it cannot happen”.

The source also said that not a lot of software testing has happened despite having a strong physical product due to unrealistic deadlines.

Aggarwal was also described as “super intense” and “brutal” in terms of calling for unplanned meetings in the middle of the night at “1 am or 3 am”.