
Airbnb Employees Speak Out About Bullying and ‘Toxic’ Work Environment - rblion
http://brokeassstuart.com/blog/2017/05/25/airbnb-employees-speak-out-about-company-bullying-tactics/
======
MichaelBurge
Large companies have enough disgruntled employees that even the laziest
journalists can find a few to generate some outrage, which drives views/clicks
to their site. Since AirBNB is a well-known name, people on HN will tend to
upvote it and commenters will self-select for people who want to rant about
AirBNB.

That's 3 selection biases here: Visibility on HN(selects for an "interesting"
story, not truth), disgruntled employees, comments will want to rant about
AirBNB. It's almost certainly a mistake to judge them negatively based on this
story.

> In 2015, Glassdoor ranked the company as the #1 place to work, in 2017 that
> ranking dropped to 35th, and many employees are speaking out.

35th "best place to work" and "people are treated like cattle"? Somebody's
giving you misleading statistics: Either it's Glassdoor.com, or the managing
editor of "broke-ass stuart".

I don't think there's a single company above 10,000 employees that you
couldn't force a similar framing on.

~~~
dieterrams
> It's almost certainly a mistake to judge them negatively based on this
> story.

Logically speaking, it would also be a mistake to dismiss every report of poor
employee treatment where those selection biases apply.

~~~
whitemale
> Logically speaking, it would also be a mistake to dismiss every report of
> poor employee treatment where those selection biases apply.

Remarkable claims require remarkable evidence, claims that are made without
evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.

If a handful of people complain out of thousands and there is no hard
evidence, then I see no reason not to just dismiss it.

~~~
dieterrams
On what grounds do you consider a claim "remarkable"?

This also isn't a standard of admittance that would work terribly well for
minorities.

------
ubikretail
It makes sense, if you compare it to the conditions of the hosts. I got people
for a year and this is remarkable:

— Not host, nor guests are legally related to AirBnB. Hence, none of the
parties is really protected, even if ABnB talks about "insurance".

— Not even the help desk is AirBnB. As they call them, they are "community
helpers", and their help is not legally linked to AirBnB.

— They changed the conditions just because, and they place them as you go in
for you to accept them. If you disagree, you have to remove yourself from the
platform via email.

— They promise a plan of prizes for good hosts. It seems that most of your
ratings should be high. It turns statistically impossible once your go into
the real conditions: must be evaluated by +80% of your hosts, and +80% of your
score must be five stars (or similar).

— They don't pay your social security, welcoming time, help, and after all
anything we call "added value".

— Nevertheless, they added surreptitious-yet-public evaluation for things
nobody is paying for, like being the tourist guide of someone who is getting a
room for 10€/night.

— They do not care about hosts opinions, in spite they are the ones putting
the real value on the platform, paying taxes for it, doing the face-to-face
with the end client, etc. If your guests arrive 8 hours early and they
complain you didn't received them, the bad scoring is on you (happened). If
your hosts leave a mess behind, AirBnB evaluates if they should cover it for
the shake of their public image, or if they rather claim that according to the
rules that is not covered.

Everybody is free to do whatever, but after my experience I trust hotels more
than anything.

~~~
saghm
> They promise a plan of prizes for good hosts....[You] must be evaluated by
> +80% of your hosts.

> If your hosts leave a mess behind, AirBnB evaluates if they should cover it
> for the shake of their public image

It seems like the word "host" is being used for both "host" and "guest" in a
few places, and I'm having trouble parsing a lot of trouble fully
understanding this comment because of it.

~~~
ubikretail
My apologies. I'm not a native speaker and switched the words as I spoke. You
are right:

> [You] must be evaluated by +80% of your GUESTS."

> If your GUESTS leave a mess behind, AirBnB evaluates if they should cover it
> for the shake of their public image.

~~~
saghm
No worries! Thanks for clarifying

------
kartan
* Headcount: 2368 people* * Hired in 2015: 1160 people [https://www.quora.com/How-many-employees-does-Airbnb-have-1](https://www.quora.com/How-many-employees-does-Airbnb-have-1)

I worked in a company with similar growing speed. And things went from good to
bad.

Everything starts with the size of the company. Upper management stops being
related with what most of their employees do. So they start to take bad
decisions promoting the wrong people. That didn't happen when the company was
500 people, as upper management knew most of them and knew personally the
people that they were promoting. That is lost way before getting to the 2000
employees mark.

First-time managers promoted ad-hoc to fill the ranks are not able to deal
with the company complexity.

So now you have employees used to voice their concerns, to be pro-active, and
demanding explanations from management decisions. But management is now
mediocre and is not able to attend the needs of high performing employees. The
company tries to play cool, but the people that believed in that way of
working is long gone.

Silos start to pop up everywhere. Departments try to protect themselves from
the chaos.

The first to leave is the leaders of the company. Those people were the ones-
to-go when you had a problem, they maybe never became managers and just wanted
to mind their business. For them is easy to find new jobs and they are tired
of fighting the new bureaucracy.

I don't know what happens next. The company I left is at this stage. Maybe
things get better, maybe they just fail. But I guess that this "best company
to work" just becomes a normal big company, and that's all.

------
Dowwie
Take caution with this kind of hyperbole.

AirBnB has grown enough that it is now an organization of organizations. Top-
down culture is subordinated by the culture of the immediate group. It's
entirely possible that these negative experiences happen within some but not
all of the groups in the company. So, it's incorrect to draw an assumption
that the entire company consists of toxic practices.

~~~
employee8000
Do you feel the same way about Uber?

~~~
Dowwie
This article is about AirBnB, right? Stick to the subject. This isn't Reddit.

------
abhinai
Heard similar stuff from a friend who used to work at AirBnb. He was an ex-
Facebook engineer who quit AirBnB even before his stocks vested because we was
so unhappy at this company.

I am really surprised. Things are going well for them as a company. Why do
they want to screw it up for themselves?

~~~
exBarrelSpoiler
Did he say why he was unhappy?

Just look at the Frightful Five. At least two of them are renowned for having
brutal, sometimes abusive, corporate cultures. Three if you include stack
ranking-era Microsoft. Having an awful culture doesn't preclude business
success.

~~~
ralfd
I only hear bad stuff about Amazon, they churn through fresh graduates. Apple
has this whole secrecy stick, but people stay long term there, even when
(especiall when?) working for Jobs. I dont recall any negative stuff about
Facebook. Google would frighten me personally, because everyone is smarter
than me and I would sink as a rock. Microsofts stack ranking seemed like
institutional crippling.

~~~
exBarrelSpoiler
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9342994](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9342994)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12502336](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12502336)

[https://mic.com/articles/154788/apple-employees-say-their-
me...](https://mic.com/articles/154788/apple-employees-say-their-mental-
health-issues-came-from-alleged-hostile-work-environment)

------
rl3
I've often heard that it's extremely difficult to maintain any real culture or
ethos beyond the amount of employees the CEO can personally manage, and that
number is around 40-50. AirBnB is _far_ beyond that, so it's no wonder.

The larger the company, the more it's going to decay and suck. The degree to
which it does is a function of management style and org structure.

Of course, Kool-Aid doesn't help matters—especially at scale where it rings
hollow.

~~~
rgbrenner
I dont know where you heard that from.. certainly not anyone with a background
in management.

There are companies that have wildly different cultures.. Google vs Walmart
for example.

Culture creation/management is taught in business school... the culture the
management creates is there to serve the purpose of the organization. In other
words, Google tries to create a culture that encourages innovation.. versus
Walmart's culture of ringing every last penny of costs out (which is done
through strict adherence to rules and procedures). It is not possible to
operate Walmart with Google's culture. The company would be bankrupt tomorrow.

There's a post a bit higher up with "you can't operate a business designed to
evade regulation without that attitude eventually permeating its entire
corporate culture"... and that is absolutely true. It's impossible for
management to hire and encourage people to break rules, and then say their own
rules are sacrosanct.

~~~
argonaut
You really can't compare companies in different industries. Most Google
employees are "knowledge" workers with some barrier to replacement. Most
Walmart employees are performing mundane service work that is largely
replaceable with any other person.

~~~
madeofpalk
Well no, you're forgetting there's a very big Walmart 'Head Office' that would
have its own culture.

~~~
rl3
Walmart Labs is likely a subculture within what you describe.

If I had to guess, unlike their masters they probably find adorning their
office walls in the stuffed trophies of union-organizing retail employees to
simply be poor taste.

------
chx
One data point does not make a whole lot but let me point this out:
[https://www.airbnb.ca/rooms/8618464](https://www.airbnb.ca/rooms/8618464)
this here is a shit road side motel. I cancelled it when I realized and I
reported it but it's still there more than a year later. It's trivial to check
what it is: there are no houses at the junction.
[https://goo.gl/maps/WsPwXxa22ho](https://goo.gl/maps/WsPwXxa22ho)

If you check the hosts' reviews it turns out he is airbnb'ing out the hotel
rooms of his father all over Israel. This is blatantly visible and yet Airbnb
lets it. Samples: "The staff at the hotel" "The place is more like a cheap
hotel or a hostel (not a "home" like other Airbnb places I've rented in the
past). "

My trip was awesome nonetheless, brief report
[http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/25981843-post8.html](http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/25981843-post8.html)
here.

~~~
ubikretail
I quit AirBnB as they pushed me to accept the new terms or either chase them
on the email to cancel my property offer.

It happened that some people came by saying they had just reserved, and I told
them I had nothing to offer. It's been +2 months and my room is still there. I
am talking about foreign people finding they have no place to sleep.

AirBnB doesn't care, as long as they have stock to bait.

------
perseusprime11
I see this as a recurring problem with companies that publish a culture deck.
It seems like the companies with culture problems are the ones that arr
emphasizing culture with these so called decks on freedom, autonomy and bean
bags.

------
jorgec
If you are good at your job and you are treated as trash then its simple: move
elsewhere.

As a former project in chief, i found that the worst employees was the first
one to complain for everything. However, i never fired somebody, i just let
them go ;-) (a fancy way to say the same)

~~~
ceejayoz
> i found that the worst employees was the first one to complain for
> everything

This sounds like a great way to dismiss any complaint you don't want to hear.

~~~
EpicEng
Not at all. The parent was talking about a pattern of behavior, not an
isolated incident. I've had the same experience; some people just want to make
a problem out of everything instead of chosing their battles wisely and
finding workable solution.

------
gaius
Whether its illegal sublets or unlicensed minicabs, you can't operate a
business designed to evade regulation without that attitude eventually
permeating its entire corporate culture. Welcome to "disruption".

~~~
patrickaljord
What about arbitrary regulations that were designed to artificially limit
supply and increase prices on customers and the fact that these regulations
won't go away because too few people know about them and there's a lobby
giving millions to law makers to make sure they won't go away? How is that not
corruption in anything but in name? How can Airbnb and others fight against
these corrupt regulations when they were design to keep new comers and
innovators out and incumbents in? It's a dirty game and if you want to play,
or change things, you have to get dirty too. I'm glad they're doing it. Same
as when you prohibit drug or alcool, it's still going to happen but way more
dirty. Who's to blame though? Willing adults who want to partake peacefully in
their preferred activities or regulators armed with guns trying to prevent
from doing these peaceful things? Hm...

~~~
pille
Airbnb is a profit-seeking corporation, not a public interest group. They're
not out to fight the good fight against "arbitrary regulation" any more than
hotels are being evil by supporting it.

If you don't like the law, you can vote, run for office, volunteer, donate to
a candidate or nonprofit, or bother your elected officials. I'm no fan of
lobbying ("corruption in anything but name"—sweetheart gigs for sympathetic
representatives once they get out of office), but it's legal for AirBnb to do
this too.

~~~
lacampbell
_If you don 't like the law, you can vote, run for office, volunteer, donate
to a candidate or nonprofit, or bother your elected officials._

In reality, you can do two things about it;

1\. Like it

2\. Absolutely nothing

This myth that an honest individual with good intentions can somehow influence
the system is harmful and needs to die. If you're not a huge corporation or
lobby group, your chances of getting a law changed is for all intents and
purposes zero.

~~~
idlewords
An individual can most definitely influence the system, but it involves doing
unappealing things like participating in open comment periods, political
organizing, labor organizing, attending meetings, making phone calls,
interacting with bureaucracies, pouring your life into standards bodies,
running for local office, and persevering in the face of indifference and
tedium.

It's a high bar to clear (I certainly haven't cleared it), but to pretend it's
impossible is the definition of cynisicm.

~~~
Consultant32452
[http://www.upworthy.com/20-years-of-data-reveals-that-
congre...](http://www.upworthy.com/20-years-of-data-reveals-that-congress-
doesnt-care-what-you-think)

Step 1: Read article

Step 2: Resume cynicism

~~~
specialist
You understand that wherever you live has city, county councils. Schools
boards and conservation and fire districts. Your state has a legislature.

Aside: I hate South Park. The smug self righteous cynicism it engenders is
just another cult, but for apathy.

~~~
Consultant32452
Sure, let's talk about my city. The mayor is on the board of the company that
manages our toll roads, so we'll never get good public transportation. At a
zoning board meeting the head chair literally said out loud, in response to
complaints, that she was impervious against any campaign against her because
alphabetically she showed up first on the ballot. Oh yeah, our governor's wife
is on the board of some medical group... I forget the details but they bilked
millions out of our senior citizens... and got re-elected.

Aside response: I don't watch South Park, so I don't know what you're even
referring to.

------
bpatel576
I'm going to be honest here and tell you guys that I didn't read most of the
article. The more I come across these headlines the more I start to feel maybe
these people that are complaining are feeling a little bit to entitled. I
wonder how they would feel if they were working at a small publicly owned
company out in Indiana. Fix the contrast bias and maybe you wouldn't feel so
bad about where you work.

~~~
mythrwy
Yes. After the things I've had to do and the people I've had to put up during
working career it's hard not to think "self entitled whiner!" when seeing
these types of headlines.

Which might not be the case in this instance, but it's definitely the first
thought that comes to mind.

------
dennisgorelik
All complaints that this article quoted are too generic. For example, what
specifically, does "people are treated like cattle" mean?

------
noway421
Can't wait to see Brian Chesky arguing with a troubled landlord at one's
property.

------
nikanj
Are our standards for "toxic" and "terrible management" too low, when the only
company without these is Etsy? Is their level of pampering the only acceptable
environment now?

~~~
exBarrelSpoiler
Stripe is renowned for having a good corporate culture.

~~~
blerpozut
Stripe is a lot smaller than Airbnb (by headcount, but also financials
probably). But it's growing quickly, and things have already started to
degrade.

So, it's coming. On the other hand, they are very savvy about branding and
comms, so they should be able to defy reality for a while ;)

Seriously, they don't get credit for how good they are at this. And they
probably wouldn't want that credit if they got it!

(You know that piece about FB's "far-reaching tentacles" from the other day? I
wonder why we haven't seen anything similar about Stripe yet. Hmmmm...)

------
macspoofing
So is this the beginning of the next internet mob to take take down another
Silicon Valley darling?

------
zxcvvcxz
I keep hearing the phrase "evade regulations" with regards to Airbnb, Uber, et
al.

Why not "increase efficiency", "increase consumer choice", "reduce prices", or
something more positive? As a user of both services (on both sides for Airbnb)
I've been quite happy.

"Evade regulations" \- let's have some context here people. Think about all
the ridiculous things that used to be illegal due to regulations. And all the
things that currently are, and are hampering small businesses [0].

We should aim to reduce regulations on transactions between private parties,
especially when these transactions leave both parties better off.

[0] - [http://www.businessinsider.com/ridiculous-regulations-big-
go...](http://www.businessinsider.com/ridiculous-regulations-big-
government-2010-11)

~~~
acdha
Those are huge companies which employ plenty of marketing & PR people. Why
should anyone else spin on their behalf without getting paid?

Similarly, while not everything the government does is perfect or the best way
to accomplish a particular goal but it's really important to remember that
there's a huge industry pushing outrageous stories to get public support for
gutting regulations which really matter. We've seen this with e.g. Steven
Milloy (the junkscience.com operator) who got his start shilling for the
tobacco companies and is a reliable anti-science voice anywhere a large
company is trying to halt or reverse regulations. He was one of the leading
voices in a quixotic-seeming DDT crusade which turned out to be an attempt to
discredit the WHO in Africa when their anti-smoking campaign was cutting into
profits[1].

Any time you read one of these outrageous law stories, the first thing you
want to check is what it actually says, followed very closely by asking who
benefits from you getting outraged by that story or becoming primed to
overreact to the concept in general.

Going with that BI story, note that the only source for the first claim is a
right-wing activist group. The actual statute very clearly shows that they're
misrepresenting the law because it actually applies only to forensics work
collecting evidence for a court:

[http://www.legis.state.tx.us/tlodocs/80R/billtext/html/HB028...](http://www.legis.state.tx.us/tlodocs/80R/billtext/html/HB02833F.htm)

Since that story was based on the Institute for Justice's claims and that's
full of lawyers, it seems quite unlikely that this is an innocent mistake
caused by ignorance of the law rather than a blatant propaganda effort relying
on the fact that most people hit forward without checking the sources.

1\.
[http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/rehabilitatingcar...](http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/rehabilitatingcarson)

~~~
acdha
… and for anyone who isn't familiar with IJ, they're a Koch- funded
institution with corporate libertarian bent:

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_Justice](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institute_for_Justice)

The author of that blog post, well, look at that page and ask how reliable a
source he is:
[http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/](http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/)

