Main image of article Top 5 Programming Languages Tesla Wants Developers to Master

Want to land a job at Tesla? As you probably know, Tesla electric vehicles are sophisticated software platforms; even if you don’t have a background in automobile manufacturing, the company needs technologists who are familiar with a handful of programming languages.

The software written in those languages power everything from Tesla vehicles’ onboard screens to their (increasingly effective) autonomous-driving capabilities. Fortunately, none of those languages are obscure, according to an analysis by Burning Glass, which collects and analyzes data from millions of job postings across the country (including Tesla’s). Take a look at this list, drawn from Tesla’s job postings over the past 90 days:

Tesla has quite the complicated tech stack, to put it mildly. Three years ago, the company’s attempts to build custom processors for autonomous driving leaked to the public. In theory, that custom hardware allows the cars to better process data than off-the-shelf silicon. On the software side, a few select leaks of Tesla’s developer dashboard show the sheer complexity of the vehicles’ onboard systems. 

 

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That complexity is no doubt a core reason why Tesla pays its software engineers quite a bit in base pay, bonuses, and stock options, according to a breakdown by levels.fyi, which crowdsources salary data  (note: for the P1 ranking, levels.fyi doesn’t include any kind of bonus):

Developers and engineers at Tesla must also manage an exceptionally hectic work environment, according to reports. Tesla CEO Elon Musk is infamous for insane production schedules, and turnover among the executive ranks has been quite high over the years. Musk would argue that pressure is exactly what it takes to build a huge, groundbreaking car company from scratch, even if it leads to reported cases of employee burnout.

But it’s also a company famous for prizing skills above all, which Musk expressing a willingness to hire even A.I. experts who don’t have a degree, provided they can do the work. If you’ve mastered the above programming languages, in other words, there’s a solid chance you could succeed in a software-related position at Tesla—provided you maintain successful work-life balance

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