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Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

susanjfowler.com

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Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#381

Post by pvg »

moocow01 wrote: post #214
pvg wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say 'my uncle (not me) in a personal injury lawsuit' and 'I used a lawyer in a contract dispute that ended right there' is a very different setting from 'this is my job that i'd like to keep'. I don't mean this is merely or even at all a matter of practical difficulty. Few people go home and toss in bed thinking about how they can sue their employer. I find 'she should have just sued' is pretty glib and why I ask…

Actually I lied Im a lawyer and have represented many class action lawsuits over my 50 years of experience and my assumption is that you are as well. Happy now?... Look, its very accessible to contact a lawyer and be professionally consulted about your legal options especially for someone who is compensated at the level of an engineer. Personally if I experienced the things exclaimed here Id be tossing in bed thinkin…

Very well.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#382

Post by sn9 »

kevinburke wrote: post #53
jmduke wrote: post #17

I am struggling to think of something productive to contribute to this discussion, because this absolutely incensed me. In lieu of anything else: Susan deserves to be commended for her bravery in writing this.

If an Uber recruiter contacts you, bring this up and tell them their nonfunctioning HR department makes working for their company a non starter. If you work at Uber, quit, and/or contact the board and tell them that this behavior is unacceptable and the people responsible need to be fired. If the culture won't change, the CEO needs to be fired. If you work in tech, bring up this article with your manager or CEO and t…

Thinking about the attrition rate of female engineers, I wonder if there's a similar rate of male engineers who leave due to how badly their female colleagues are treated in addition to the other factors listed in this thread and Fowler's piece.

If so, that would imply that the engineering culture is being distilled into an evermore toxic workplace, since those who stay are those who make the place toxic or are simply people who try to work around it.

It would take an extremely focused and persistent effort on the part of upper management to change this trajectory before the company implodes, as I suspect is inevitable in the long run should my assumptions prove accurate.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#383

Post by withdavidli »

jacquesm wrote: post #100
brudgers wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If taking a billion dollars from the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia says something about a company's stance regarding women's equality, what it says is not terribly inconsistent with Fowler's story.

That's an interesting angle that I had not considered. That money is such a weird thing from another viewpoint as well, it means that Uber doesn't have to perform at all for the next decade or so, they can basically wait out all of their competition. It removes every incentive to actually perform which might be just what it takes to kill them.

>it means that Uber doesn't have to perform at all for the next decade or so

more like little over 1 year [0]. Originally wanted to say 2 years, didn't know loss climbed to $3B last year.

[0]https://techcrunch.com/2016/12/21/uber-losses-expected-to-hi...

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#384

Post by RodericDay »

dllthomas wrote: post #220
AsyncAwait wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that due to the perception that they broke the recent anti-Trump taxi strike, rather than their internal work culture?

> the perception that they broke the recent anti-Trump taxi strike Something, it's worth noting, no less true of Lyft. And I think it's a little weird to be demanding owners of infrastructure lock out workers "in support of a strike". That whole reaction was absurd. This article gives me substantially more pause.

Lyft kept operating, Uber reacted to the strike by fixing low prices ensuring good will with desperate customers.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#385

Post by tomlu »

u_wot_m8 wrote: post #54
davedx wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because they're "high performers". Screw Uber. Just delete that app and never use it.

I'd like the think that eventually karma will catch up with Uber. Hard to think of a single positive thing to say about the company.

It should cost them employment talent, which should be a factor against them versus other employers with less toxic work cultures, all else being equal.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#386

Post by jacques_chester »

blhack wrote: post #277
bootload wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Culture was extremely heavy on the drinking;" For me this is a red flag. Booze + programming == pissed programming This leads to bad code also bad team dynamics. Ultimately this will reflect on the product and bottom line. For individuals this reads like a culture where the barrel is creating ^bad apples^. Not a good look on a resume.

I have to be honest, I know a lot of people who claim that they can write really good code if they've been drinking. I just absolutely do not understand how that is even possible. If I have ONE beer, it throws off my ability to write good code, or hold all of the concepts in my head. One of the weekly coworking meetups I go to always ends at a brewery (there is a brewery next door to the hackerspace where it is held)…

Alcohol increases confidence in one's abilities.

Everyone has some skill they insist they are "better at" when drunk.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#387

Post by morgante »

blhack wrote: post #277
bootload wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Culture was extremely heavy on the drinking;" For me this is a red flag. Booze + programming == pissed programming This leads to bad code also bad team dynamics. Ultimately this will reflect on the product and bottom line. For individuals this reads like a culture where the barrel is creating ^bad apples^. Not a good look on a resume.

I have to be honest, I know a lot of people who claim that they can write really good code if they've been drinking. I just absolutely do not understand how that is even possible. If I have ONE beer, it throws off my ability to write good code, or hold all of the concepts in my head. One of the weekly coworking meetups I go to always ends at a brewery (there is a brewery next door to the hackerspace where it is held)…

There are certain types of code which I can unequivocally write better after a few drinks. It's honestly mostly low-complexity drudge work which needs to get done but when sober I can't power through it as fast due to (a) boredom and (b) overanalysis of simple tasks.

This certainly isn't all the code I write (far from it) and it's not for everyone, but it's definitely true for me. That's why I don't think saying alcohol and code can never mix is right, but I agree that it shouldn't be a daily occurrence or the central aspect of company culture. I don't think an optional, after-work happy hour on occasion is such a bad thing though.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#388

Post by male_no_30122 »

A blog post like this gets so much attention where is the fucking evidence? I am a male from Iran having spent more than half of my life here and worked in Silicon Valley long enough to be considered an easy target for labels like terrorist and misogynist simultaneously (finally I'm beginning to believe it, how slow of me.) I have to say there is more and more similarities between the two with each passing day, with very little substance and meaning behind those concepts, just a vague feeling of unfairness, a thread to our identity and a powerful tool to control and manipulate and not on behalf of the proclaimed victims of course.

Why should YC or VCs give more money to females founders, blacks and hispanics? [1] [2] Are we not pawns in an ugly game of moral superiority and virtue played out by those looking to profit from our moral outrage and fear?

[1] http://blog.samaltman.com/2017-yc-annual-letter (much high acceptance rate for those demographics)

[2] https://techcrunch.com/2016/10/26/winnie-grabs-2-5-million-f... (a publication about babies raises 2.5MM, female founders, having worked at places like Google and Twitter gets you a free pass with VCs if you're a woman? Homebrew Capital: Well her, she must be special not her male-counter-parts. What is special and investment-worthy about this publication and those founders, and not just adding an uptick in their portfolio's founder ratio? Hey look we got two female founders in one round!)

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#389

Post by someone13 »

uber_031917 wrote: post #172

Uber employee here. This was a disheartening story to read to say the least. I hope that she sues as her case is abundantly clear and the response by HR and the management chain was absolutely unacceptable. If what happened is true, they should be held accountable. Unfortunately, from my perspective, Uber has a track record of lack of accountability when it comes to leadership/managers. Pretty much everyone I know at…

I mean this in the nicest way possible, so please don't take this as anything personally directed at you, but: any employee of Uber that feels strongly about this should find another company to work at. If you're working in tech, in the current employment market in the Bay Area, finding another job is not hard. Not easy, both in the sense that leaving a job can be scary, and that interviews can be draining - but doable.

There are other companies out there that solve interesting, challenging problems and don't have this toxic culture. There are other companies with talented people. And if enough of your coworkers disagree with Uber's culture, policies, etc., then the talented, moral people that you work with at Uber may even come with you.

The only way Uber will ever pay attention is if it affects their bottom line. Employees leaving, or people turning down offers is, person-for-person, one of the most impactful ways to do this.

Re: Reflecting on one very, very strange year at Uber

#390

Post by tyingq »

bifocald wrote: post #234
krautsourced wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Usually in these cases, these kind of company politics trickle down from the top, so it's unlikely the CEO does not know or has any interest in intervening. All the companies I worked at that had weird or toxic environments showed that kind of environment throughout most of their structure. A single arsehole in an otherwise great company is usually pushed out sooner than later. If however you notice there are mostly…

Yes. Culture is CEO's responsibility. Period.

The story got picked up by the Verge, and there's a response from Uber's CEO...

http://www.theverge.com/2017/2/19/14664474/uber-sexism-alleg...

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