[0xB31B1B]

It might be time for people to realize that the lived experience of the vast majority of Uber employees does not match the ridiculous charicature that the media portrays. (I am not saying there wasn't harassment or bullying, that Susan's stories aren't true, or that the board and upper management seems like a circus right now.) Source, meyself and my co workers at Uber.

Btw, I am an Uber employee, AMA.

[KirinDave]

It's interesting to me how many people who say the environment is "not toxic" are men in the tech organization who've been there a long time.

I've helped 2 women find new work, moving from the chaos of Uber. Both saying variants of "the shit I took there was only offset by the stock's possible valur and the waymo stuff calls that into question."

Is the divide between men and women's experience there that intensely different, I wonder?

[rrix2]

We (I work at Uber) dealt with insane growth in a toxic fashion and are now paying down the debt of letting toxicity rule us for the last three years. I'm still of the opinion that we are doing that, even if it's only to enable the shareholders to make their money. And we're doing that through efforts that, anywhere else, would be noteworthy and exciting. Everyone I work with has various classes of stories like these, but by and large the non-minority men have not been so negatively affected as those who don't have that going for them. I've been through the ringer myself, but I've been in a spot where I can come out ahead despite having been in the same reporting structure as Susan Rigetti.

A lot of us are still here in hope that the folks like Saad, Gandahar and Kalanick who have left are replaced with people with an ounce of emotional intelligence like Frances Frey. Folks who are in a position and mindset to force the structure of the company to grow. Seeing Kalanick apologists like Saad leave is one of the best signs we might finally be ready to do that. It's going to be a long slow slog of 'losing' people like them until we're in a place where we're not actively villains, but I still think the company could do it or I'd be gone.

[KirinDave]

I appreciate your comment and your decision not to obfuscate your identity. Thank you very much.

[praneshp]

I'm not related to Uber in anyway, but being a man with a longer tenure in a company shouldn't be a reason to discount someone's opinion (or possibly in your comment's case, hinting that they were the reason for toxicity).

[KirinDave]

My post doesn't dismiss anyone's opinion. Heck, it explicitly asks for comment on why this might be so. Nor was I hinting that any one person is the cause. I do not think it is the work of any one person, even Travis.

But it's striking what a very reliable classifier the union of 'man?' and 'yearsAtUber >>> (> 4)' is in figuring out who's vocally unhappy about Travis leaving. Perhaps I am simply suffering from availability bias and therefore don't know about all the satisfied and successful women at Uber speaking up that their experience is positive.

[amrrs]

Thanks AMA #1:

Did Kalanick really set up and encourage a bro Culture? Did he respect fellow employees as humans or was just running behind business success?

[wenttomarket]

Uber employee and can answer this:

Travis had a deep empathy for the challenges of building successful products, and would offer tremendous grace and thoughtful advice to his team solving problems in the trenches. When projects went sideways, and we presented numbers that were less than stellar, Travis was both empathetic and optimistic while offering actionable guidance and a path forward.

"Bro culture" is a loaded term and the wrong one to describe the environment Travis cultivated. He had tremendous focus on the problems at hand and pushed his team to operate with a sense of urgency to solve them. If anything I think he cared too much about each individual problem, which propelled his teams forward but sometimes left him too deep in the details of his business rather than focusing on the big picture.

[rhizome]

Sounds like the most diplomatic way to describe a "do it yesterday" micromanager, or, at the very least, a nondelegating CEO (often seen in family businesses).

[matt4077]

This... doesn't answer the question?

[jamesmishra]

Former Uber employee here.

> Did Kalanick really set up and encourage a bro Culture?

No, not at all. He's a grown man and unbelievably serious about Uber.

> Did he respect fellow employees as humans

Yes. Always.

> or was just running behind business success?

I don't know what this means, but Travis Kalanick is absolutely the main reason that Uber has grown faster than almost any other company in history.

[matt4077]

> It might be time for people to realize that the lived experience of the vast majority of Uber employees...

That's just awfully close to that "9 out of 10 people enjoy..." joke.