While attending San Jose State University, I had a heavy interest in Tesla as a company and the products they were building. I got an interview from a college friend of mine, Vybhav Kandadai, another car salesman at the Santana Row showroom in San Jose. I nailed the interview after expressing my knowledge of Elon's vision for Tesla, SpaceX, and Solar City. I made quick friends with my co-workers, and have lasting relationships with many of them from my experience there. The Santana Row location was the flagship store for Tesla, so we got many affluent visitors, such as professional athletes, actors/actresses, Steve Wozniak, and even Elon himself. This high-stakes environment allowed me to refine my communication skills professionally.

In this position, I represented Tesla as a showroom guru educating walk-in clients on Tesla's line of innovative electric vehicles, such as the Model S, Model X, and upcoming Model 3. Interested clients would be invited to set up a test drive, where I would copilot them while they tested the vehicle's features (ie Autopilot) on the freeway. I would then guide them through our online Design Studio to personalize a vehicle to their needs. If the client was in the direct market and satisfied with the vehicle, we would go over payment options (ie cash, lease, or financing) to begin the car-building process.

Ultimately, I left the job because I quickly found that moving from selling cars to an engineering position was difficult due to the size of the company. I felt I had also reached the limit on the challenges I was being presented with and wanted to move to a more challenging technical job that took advantage of what I was studying in school. I am grateful for the opportunity I had at Tesla, the valuable lessons I learned, and the connections I made along the way.