Uber is yet another company plagued with an internal culture of persecution, prejudice, and retaliation. The pattern of trivializing offensive behaviors reported to a Human Resources department resulted in an embarrassing and reputation damaging viral blog post by past Uber software engineer, Susan Fowler. The blog post recounts multiple examples of discrimination and favoritism at the company.
Gender discrimination
Gender discrimination, workplace sexism, reprisal, and harassment are illegal under the expansion of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act 1964 which upholds the rights to equal opportunity and doing the right thing.
Anti-discrimination laws and workplace infrastructure clash when guardians of civil rights are not within the locus of power in the culture.
Uber
Uber Technologies Incorporated is a privately held company headquartered in San Francisco, California. This global ride-sharing transportation network which develops direct to consumers software applications has revenues exceeding $5.5 billion. Uber’s status, name, and reputation have been downgraded in a public relations nightmare due to additional mistakes and miscalculations including:
- Company decisions during a taxi strike
- Unresponsiveness to passenger safety
- Insensitive advertisements
Consequently, the voice of the people cried against the cost of doing business in this manner with more than 200,000 Uber consumers cancelling their accounts at the massive company.
Mitigate outrage
In an effort to mitigate the overwhelming public wrath, former Attorney General Eric Holder has been hired by Uber CEO Travis Kalanick to conduct an investigation inclusive of a widening circle cultural problems. The fact-finding team will also include Arianna Huffington, Associate General Counsel Angela Padilla, and Human Resources head Liane Hornsey. They will be conducting one-on-one listening session with company employees. In addition, the CEO released a company response statement that corporate diversity statistics would be released.
