Let’s face it – rarely do we ever use taxis these days. We’re all grabbing an Uber ride to get around. But how did we get to this point?
The last decades brought into the spotlight a lot of young entrepreneurs who managed to raise startups to global heights, perpetuating multiple industries. And the ride-sharing sector was no different. Uber Technology Inc. is a startup that shaped the ride-sharing industry during the last decade, and with its Uber ride service marketed as “everyone’s personal driver”, the company evolved into a multi-billion dollar startup in a matter of a few years.
Uber’s co-founder and former CEO, Travis Kalanick, has led the startup through one of the most staggering development and expansion paths we ever saw. In just 7 years of the mandate at the helm of the company, Kalanik’s business culture managed to propel Uber to activate in more than 70 countries. Its founder had repeatedly stated how much he loved the startup, and we could all agree that he worked and was working a lot for the ride-sharing company. After all, his competitive spirit, passion, and entrepreneurial vision are some of the main ingredients for his success.
But, one problem, or rather a set of problems, appeared in 2017 with the Uber scandal and that would later be known as the “us” problem of Uber.
We can see in Uber 2017 a case that perfectly portrays the idea of “winning, but at what cost?”. The company had a group of top management executives who paid no attention to their behavior, a questionable corporate culture, and an inappropriate set of values. If that’s not enough, its CEO, Travis Kalanick, seemed to be blind to all of this. So, he was regarded as the actual problem following the events of the year 2017.
Sexual harassment. Gender discrimination. A toxic work environment. All of these issues were brought to light in the public eye, and unfortunately, the ride-sharing startup had to suffer from it. So what exactly caused the Uber scandal and how did Uber face these allegations? Well, its culture and its management did, with Travis Kalanick at the top – and this is how the Travin Kalanick scandal started. In a matter of a few months, from the beginning of 2017 to June of the same year, Uber went from the best-performing startup to one of the worst management crises we’ve seen.
It all started with an Uber ex-engineer, Susan Fowler, who decided to share her story during her time working for the ride-sharing company on her blog. It was not good. She made accusations of gender discrimination and sexual harassment and complained about the hopelessness of the HR department taking any action when she addressed the issues triggering the Travis Kalanick scandal.
This was back in February 2017, and Kalanick quickly reacted to the blog post, saying - “We seek to make a just workplace and there can be absolutely no place for this kind of behavior at Uber—and anyone who behaves this way or thinks this is OK will be fired.”
Even more so, while claiming that was the first time such accusations were being brought to his attention, Kalanick and Uber brought the ex-US general attorney Eric Holder to investigate the claims. They also assigned 3 female members as collaborators in this investigation. Might this have been an attempt to seem less of a misogynistic ruled company? Maybe. But business started going all down from then onwards with the Uber scandal.
The company was already badly viewed by some people, with a record of experimenting with driverless cars that ended up with a pedestrian killed, an open suitcase with Google’s division Waymo that claimed Uber stole intellectual property through the acquisition of the self-driving trucks startup Otto, rape and violence cases filed on behalf of its customers and drivers and so on. With all of these things going so bad outside the company, people needed a spark to light up the flame that would pressure Uber’s management to finally review the company from within.
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As a cherry on top, Uber’s CEO made things worse by being… himself. At least at the time.
Blame it on the stress, or say that’s what the guy always was, but in March 2017, Bloomberg published a video that was filmed with a board camera during an Uber ride that featured Travis Kalanick and 2 women presumably going home after a party. The video ends as a nightmare for the company as Kalanick enters a hot discussion with the driver, who is accusing him of changing payments at Uber. While the driver is complaining about losing all his money, Uber’s CEO can be seen yelling:
“Some people don’t like to take responsibility for their own shit - and then getting out of the car with a simple - Good Luck!”
Almost at the same time, a report started buzzing online, talking about a team of 5 paywalled employees at Uber partying with escorts back in 2014 in Seoul, Korea. With Kalanick among the names involved in the report, it was enough for the public to conclude that Uber’s founder was reportedly a “douchebag”.
New investigations started firing up, and as a result, around 20 employees were fired after being found guilty of accusations of harassment, discrimination, and bullying. Just think about the fact that between 2012 and 2017, there were more than 200 such accusations filed by employees regarding the work environment at Uber.
At that point, it seemed like Uber couldn’t stop digging its own grave, with problems arising one after another.
To prove once more the premise that Kalanick's management style and values were allowing for a toxic men-ruled environment to be created, the David Bonderman case got the media’s attention. To think that this guy couldn’t keep his mouth shut during a time when the company was on fire and chose to make a sexist remark towards the female members on the board of the company.
When Ariana Huffington announced the number of women increasing among the board members, Bonderman interrupted her by stating - “Actually what it shows is that it’s much more likely to be more talking.”
Travis Kalanick was forced to step back from the company’s helm by some of the five most important investors that backed Uber at the time. He still kept his shares in the company and managed to stay as an advisor to the board of directors, but he could no longer be Chief Executive. When he left his position, Kalanick stated:
“I love Uber more than anything in the world and at this difficult moment in my personal life, I have accepted the investors’ request to step aside so that Uber can go back to building rather than be distracted with another fight,”
Now we can agree that the case of Uber is of great importance for all of us, as Uber has expanded rapidly across the globe and influenced everyone’s life while disrupting the transportation industry forever. The problem with its CEO, Travis Kalanick, was the fact that he couldn’t mature himself as a business leader fast enough, and his corporate culture followed his lead.
The problem with Uber was not what they were offering. And it was not just the case of a few bad actors either. Instead, it was a systemic issue with the company’s culture and values. Uber had been prioritizing growth and expansion at the expense of employee well-being and ethical conduct.
While we expect these leaders to grow and mature with their companies, examples like Kalanick’s only show that ignoring such issues can have serious consequences not only for employees but also for the reputation of your company.
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