The message is reminiscent of an earlier communication from Musk during his initial days at Twitter, where he instructed employees to send a one-page summary of their monthly achievements and how these aligned with their set goals.
Instead of having discussions with Shedd in these conferences, TTS staff were taken aback to find themselves engaging with unfamiliar faces they had never encountered in their work before.
“It was a very perplexing call because I expected to meet with you, but I was instead confronted by two individuals who were hesitant to reveal their identities,” an employee from TTS expressed to Shedd in an open Slack channel, among several examined by WIRED. “They hadn’t reviewed the information I had submitted in my form, so I was left to explain without the visuals and links I had provided,” another employee commented.
“I had the identical experience,” a different employee mentioned. “The person I met with was completely unaware of the Google form I submitted, and when I referenced it, I was met with evasion.”
In a Slack message sent to TTS staff on Thursday morning, which was obtained by WIRED, Shedd expressed regret for the unclear and abrupt meeting invites, as well as for including unnamed individuals in the discussions who entered with Gmail addresses.
“These individuals are in the process of being onboarded to receive a GSA laptop and PIV card. I accept full responsibility for their actions during the calls. I’ve instructed them to start the calls by introducing themselves and confirming their role as my advisors,” Shedd stated in a screenshot of the Slack message inspected by WIRED.
Shedd assured employees that those on the calls had been “vetted by me and were invited into the call.” He noted that they were physically present with him at the GSA headquarters, and he had “badged them all into the building,” suggesting that the participants did not yet possess official government IDs assigned to agency personnel.
At least two of these individuals appeared to be “college students possessing disturbingly high A-suite clearance,” one TTS insider reported to WIRED. (A-suite clearances link employees to the GSA administrator’s office.)
One individual mentioned being included in a review alongside Edward Coristine, a recent high school graduate who spent several months with Neuralink, Musk’s brain-computer interface company, previously identified by WIRED as someone working at the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and directly reporting to its new chief of staff, Amanda Scales, a former xAI employee. He has not responded to WIRED’s inquiries, and OPM has opted not to comment.
“We do not have any personnel announcements to share at this time,” a GSA spokesperson informed WIRED on Thursday.
It is commonplace for TTS employees to collaborate with other government agencies, as many of their projects involve sensitive external data. However, the demand for them to disclose specific technical achievements alarmed some staff who were concerned about violating these agreements.
“The team is justified in feeling apprehensive about discussing details related to other agencies during these calls and should continue to adhere to the existing guidelines, which advise against sharing sensitive information,” Shedd commented in the GSA Slack on Thursday. “The aim of these discussions is to review interesting example problems or successes and delve into how those accomplishments were achieved—a moment for you to showcase how you resolved an issue.”
