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Uber CEO to take leave

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Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#131

Post by rajathagasthya »

barsonme wrote: post #64
rajathagasthya wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What percentage do you need it to be to acknowledge sexual harassment is a problem in that company?

Why not flip it around a bit: what percentage do you think? Don't get me wrong, I'm not advocating for Uber or sexual harassment or any nonsense like that. I (seriously) just want to know if you're advocating for giving every company with a > 0.0% harassment rate the Uber treatment.

I'm not the one dismissing a blatant problem based on a tiny percentage value. We've seen in various accounts that many incidents were swept under the rug because the person was a supposed "high performer". Then there is the recent email issue. This suggests that the problem is top-down in the company. When the problem is top-down, surely you deserve such treatment?

Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#132

Post by majani »

dvt wrote: post #21

I really don't buy the Travis Kalanik hate. Yeah, Uber started out as your typical SV unicorn (bro warts and all). Yeah, Uber's entire business model can be described as "grey-area" at best and its business practices as sometimes exploitative. But this is exactly how you're supposed to run a massively successful startup in its first decade. This is exactly how FB started out. And this follows every rule in the startu…

Giant freelance marketplaces tend to be lightning rods for outrage largely because of their tendency to directly drive down wages. Search this site for any of the large developer marketplaces and you'll be hard pressed to find a kind word being said about them. This effect automatically creates a sizeable constituency hell bent on exposing your wrongs and it's downhill from there from a PR perspective.

Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#133

Post by jaclaz »

dvt wrote: post #39
exogeny wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He presided over a culture of widespread sexual harassment that has been echoed repeatedly by multiple employees and you don't really understand why he's being criticized? Cool story, bro.

Uber has 12000 employees; 20 were reprimanded for sexual harassment. That's 0.001%

>Uber has 12000 employees; 20 were reprimanded for sexual harassment. That's 0.001%

Well those are the ones that were actually fired.

http://business.financialpost.com/news/transportation/uber-h...

Seemingly:

215 issues investigated

100 dismissed

57 still under investigation

31 in counseling or training

7 reprimanded in writing

more than 20 fired

215/12000 is near to 2%, such a number of "cases", even if half of them are dismissed should trigger each and every possible alarm.

Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#134

Post by digitaltrees »

dvt wrote: post #21

I really don't buy the Travis Kalanik hate. Yeah, Uber started out as your typical SV unicorn (bro warts and all). Yeah, Uber's entire business model can be described as "grey-area" at best and its business practices as sometimes exploitative. But this is exactly how you're supposed to run a massively successful startup in its first decade. This is exactly how FB started out. And this follows every rule in the startu…

Honestly, I think this has more to do with Uber's inability to become profitable than genuine concern for these problems. People have know about these problems but ignored them for exactly the reasons you describe. I'd say the investigation is almost a pretext.

Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#135

Post by linkregister »

vkou wrote: post #130
blfr wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These are consumer protection laws in name only. The laws/rules/regulations that Uber is breaking are first, foremost, and pretty much exclusively protecting the taxi industry.

I'm glad that you feel confident that no background checks, no vehicle inspection checks, no in-between-ride insurance, no transparency into surge pricing, no adherence to accessibility requirements, as well as getting grey-balled off the system (If Uber suspects you work for a municipal government or law enforcement) are run-arounds to spurious, burdensome, and unnecessary laws. I mean, I have the unreasonable expec…

Were the taxi background checks in New York and San Francisco more comprehensive than those done by Uber?

Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#136

Post by rajathagasthya »

Fricken wrote: post #71
rajathagasthya wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What percentage do you need it to be to acknowledge sexual harassment is a problem in that company?

How many high level departures do you need to read about to acknowledge Uber is doing something about it? Maybe if it went all the way to the top, and Travis Kalanick himself stood down for a while, maybe then you'd ease off?

Did I say Uber isn't doing anything about it? The parent comment dismissed a clear problem in the company and was being all revisionist now that TK is on a leave by saying that he's a ruthless business leader running a typical SV unicorn and is being treated "unfairly". I pointed out that he failed to see a problem.

Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#137

Post by lhorie »

compiler-guy wrote: post #89
dvt wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber has 12000 employees; 20 were reprimanded for sexual harassment. That's 0.001%

Details matter--get this one right, please! Twenty were _fired_ for sexual harassment issues. Given what we know of Uber's internal culture, my money says that many, many more were counseled, reprimanded or whatever than just those twenty.

IIRC, of the 215 cases that were investigated, 20 resulted in termination, some 17 resulted in warnings (i.e. if HR hears complaints about you again, you're fired), and some 27 resulted in counseling. The rest were found to be either simple enough to resolve with a conversation, or about ex-employees, or lacking information, or unfounded accusations.

There's now a new anonymous hotline where employees can report harassment, so presumably any new reported cases will be investigated by the law firm that was hired for this.

Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#138

Post by dvt »

barleyworth wrote: post #78
dvt wrote: post #21

I really don't buy the Travis Kalanik hate. Yeah, Uber started out as your typical SV unicorn (bro warts and all). Yeah, Uber's entire business model can be described as "grey-area" at best and its business practices as sometimes exploitative. But this is exactly how you're supposed to run a massively successful startup in its first decade. This is exactly how FB started out. And this follows every rule in the startu…

> There was literally nothing wrong with the email There were at least two things wrong with the email, from my perspective as a guy who's been around plenty of benign bro culture. 1. Explicitly mentioning "sex" as opposed to "relationship" or "dating", and talking about it so casually, sets a very aggressive tone. 20-something guys with lots of hormones will definitely hear that tone and push hard for sex during the…

> ... mentioning "sex" as opposed to "relationship" or "dating" ...

Sex is a natural human activity. People fuck all the time. People especially fuck at parties where there's alcohol involved.

> ... even if you assume that the guys will be asking for consent ...

Uh, what? The entire point was to ask for consent. I can't speak to your other hypothesizing about tone, or what 20-something guys might or might not do.

> ... there are many people on the team that the Travis wants to sleep with ...

Not sure where you're getting "many." Regardless, Travis probably wants to sleep with some of his employees, but he's leading by example and not pursuing. Again, I can't speak to your mental gymnastics as to what an employee might infer or not.

I can only read what's in the email.

Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#139

Post by pavlov »

cmyr wrote: post #95
pavlov wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"... the 'cultural' interview where there gave me an example of them knowingly breaking the law because "they knew they were right" and then asked if I had a similar work experience" Incredible. Isn't this how mafia organizations hire? I don't know if this interview method would expose Uber to liability under organized crime laws, but maybe it should.

'Mafias' in the broad sense and the Cosa Nostra in particular don't often interview external candidates. /sorry

Organized crime doesn't have to work exactly like the Cosa Nostra to qualify. I guess neither of us know enough about the relevant law to take this discussion much further.

Re: Uber CEO to take leave

#140

Post by kolbe »

Law obviously isn't the same thing as morality. SS soldiers also didn't break any laws, while Oskar Schindler was a criminal by legal definition. You may see an attitude that doesn't bend over to all decrees from the government as "rotten," but the most interesting and intelligent people I've ever met wouldn't agree.
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