
Uber's 'hustle-oriented' culture becomes a black mark on employees' résumés - anandsuresh
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/mar/07/uber-work-culture-travis-kalanick-susan-fowler-controversy
======
Animats
It can be worse. Something similar is happening to the "binary option"
industry in Tel Aviv, Israel. A "binary option" is a bet on whether some
financial indicator will go up or down. While there are such things as real
binary options on real exchanges, the ones sold from phone banks in Tel Aviv
are bets against the house. The house sets the odds and usually wins, and even
when they lose, most binary option shops don't pay up. 80% of investors lose
everything. In Israel, it's illegal to scam Israelis this way, but completely
legal to scam the rest of the world.

The scale of this industry is substantial. It's doing at least $1.2 billion a
year in income, and that's the part that pays taxes in Israel. This has been
going on for almost a decade, and the scam was growing rapidly.

Then, in 2016, the jaws began to close. The US CFTC won a big case against the
biggest binary option firm in Israel, Banc de Binary. They had to pay back
everybody who lost money and pay huge damages. (Banc de Binary once offered
$10,000 to anyone who would remove that info from their Wikipedia entry. That
attempt backfired, badly.) Then there was a 15-part expose in the Times of
Israel, titled "The Wolves of Tel Aviv".[1] Now, finally, there are more
investigations and a bill to make it illegal to run this scam out of Israel.
Banc De Binary ceased operation a few weeks ago. (Or at least they
disappeared, removing their sign from the Banc De Binary Tower.) At least four
other binary option "brokers" have gone out of business in recent weeks.

As a result, there are lots of layoffs. Scamming people from a phone bank was
a good-paying job. The companies liked to hire recent immigrants to Israel who
could speak the languages of their target countries fluently. English and
Arabic were the most popular languages. A lobbyist for the binary option
industry, testifying before a committee of the Knesset, claimed that there are
20,000 people employed in binary options in Israel, and 60,000 people
indirectly. "You see the building boom right now in Tel Aviv? Well, you can
just say goodbye to that because most skyscrapers in Tel Aviv will be empty.
There will be no one to fill them up." There's even a claim from the binary
option industry that shutting down this scam will increase terrorism, because
it will take away the income of thousands of Arabs.

So 20,000 scammers are becoming unemployed, in a city of only 400,000 people.
A former employee of a binary option company faces a far worse black mark than
being from Uber. The binary option salespeople are full time con artists.
Nobody legit in finance is going to hire them. Getting any legit job will be
tough.

(World's smallest violin plays.)

[1] [http://www.timesofisrael.com/the-wolves-of-tel-aviv-
israels-...](http://www.timesofisrael.com/the-wolves-of-tel-aviv-israels-vast-
amoral-binary-options-scam-exposed/)

~~~
Flammy
I've heard pieces of this story, so thank you for the history and summary.

I suspect what you say is true, this is a 'black mark'. Working for Uber?
Maybe if you are in upper management, would it be a similar "black mark" but
even then, are you going to blame every C_O for their scandals? Probably not
all. As for the 98% of employees? I doubt working for Uber will seriously
impact their next job (and much less all following jobs).

Just think, today we don't hold it against middle management or individual
contributors who happened to be employed at Enron at the wrong time...

~~~
twunde
Actually after Enron was exposed, most former employees head a very difficult
time getting hired. It was a major black mark, made worse by the fact that
many employees had significant savings in Enron stock.

~~~
whatok
This really depended on what their role was. Many star traders or analysts
were able to get re-hired almost immediately or start their own firms without
a problem. Here's an example:

[https://books.google.com/books?id=qwDFL2xIX4kC&pg=PA88&lpg=P...](https://books.google.com/books?id=qwDFL2xIX4kC&pg=PA88&lpg=PA88&dq=enron+de+shaw&source=bl&ots=y2ivRoK0_D&sig=7zzdLRutwKKW0F0PgvRvKNIUwaI&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjj5fnRg8fSAhVL8CYKHZ04CuUQ6AEIODAF#v=onepage&q=enron%20de%20shaw&f=false)

~~~
pinewurst
That's a pretty good book, btw...

------
ziszis
This is a classic halo effect [1]. A positive halo was "Google is making lots
of money and they have 20% time. So, smart companies should do this." This is
a negative halo "Uber is experiencing lots of bad PR and hustling is part of
their culture. So, smart companies should stop being scrappy."

The problem isn't scrappiness. It is when you push far past scrappiness and
start breaking the law.

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_effect](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_effect)

~~~
itake
Uber is not the first (or the last) company to get in trouble for too much
"hustling"[0].

It is not just the "hustle" people don't like. People view their employees as
sexist bigots. All the smart companies don't want people from that culture.

[0] [https://techcrunch.com/2016/02/11/zenefits-under-
investigati...](https://techcrunch.com/2016/02/11/zenefits-under-
investigation-in-california/)

~~~
ganfortran
Won't go too far to say all Uber employees are sexist bigots, but I do, after
all these media exposure, now have a images they have a strong feel-good bro
culture

~~~
manmal
I think a company with a strong and directed culture will even absorb former
"bro dudes" successfully and de-bro them. (Meaning, they will learn empathy
and stop behaving in a way that hurts others)

~~~
yulaow
Doubt it. Mainly because if a company has a strong and directed culture they
would bounce-back every bro-dudes already in the interview phase for "not a
culture fit"

~~~
sokoloff
There's a spectrum of bro-ness, and I've seen pretty hardcore stereotypical
"frat guys" at 22 mature into "normal" adult human beings on a regular basis.

If you can keep your bro-ness under wraps for 4 hours for the interview, you
can get hired at a company with a reasonable culture and that will continue to
mold and shape you, just like any other community influence to which you are
consistently exposed.

~~~
ubernostrum
Why is it someone else's job to "un-bro" them? Why can't it be their job to do
it for themselves, and just have them find out they're unemployable in their
desired job unless/until they do? Companies insist they won't hire people
who'd need to learn other fundamental skills of the job (and that if you want
the job, learn that stuff first), so why not this?

~~~
sokoloff
It is/ought to be, but the stark reality is that you can hide it and appear
"normal enough" for 4 hours of interviews.

I'm not making a judgment about "ought to be" just "is".

------
patgenzler
This piece is another cheap "strike it while the iron is hot" hit job to get
attention. Yes, Uber seems to be having serious culture issues but the
underlying problems of sexism and favoritism towards "high achievers" are
industry-wide - not just limited to Uber. They have a lot at stake - it's only
fair to assume that they will come out of this mess and fix their problems as
soon as possible.

Uber employees, both current and former, will have _no problem_ getting good
offers - tech companies have biases but are smart enough not to mass
generalize. The fact that they "made it into Uber" far outweighs any
speculation around Uber's culture.

The real black mark is the "hit job oriented" culture of media. They need to
step back and rethink what they stand for.

~~~
coryfklein
> Yes, Uber seems to be having serious culture issues but the underlying
> problems of sexism and favoritism towards "high achievers" are industry-wide
> - not just limited to Uber.

Although these issues are experienced everywhere, they appear to have a higher
occurrence at Uber, so it makes sense to focus more on Uber than the industry
as a whole.

> it's only fair to assume that they will come out of this mess and fix their
> problems as soon as possible

That's appears to be part of the issue with Uber - their culture of self-
promotion at all costs. I have no doubt Uber will do whatever they can to make
it through this mess. My major concern is that "whatever they can" is merely
superficial change, like maybe firing some token dude who's only been there a
month and saying, "See? We've changed!"

The linked article, by associating risk with merely being employed at Uber,
does the industry a favor by helping uber to do the Right Thing and protect
itself by protecting its employees.

The real change that needs to happen, is that people that work at Uber are
safe. What better way to make that happen then threaten Uber's ability to hire
and retain talent?

~~~
dllthomas
> firing some token dude who's only been there a month

I assume this is in reference to Amit Singhal. I don't think "some token dude"
is a good characterization of the Senior Vice President of Engineering, and
while that was a good sign it's very much not all Uber is doing.

I work at Uber, and _many_ of us are quite fired up about holding the company
to account. While there are definitely things we can critique, it does seem
that the situation being taken seriously and we're all hoping (and, with
reservations, expecting) that there will be real change.

~~~
patgenzler
Amen.

------
am_i_down
Willingness to generalize an entire group seems far more deserving of a black
mark.

~~~
zippergz
Hiring is hard. We have to use all the data points available to us. If someone
seems to have thrived in a culture that is counter to the culture we're trying
to build, that's a valuable data point.

~~~
mantas
Insert {protected minority} and see how it sounds.

People may have worked there for a variety of reasons and/or in different
team. Let alone that stuff like Stockholm syndrome exists for a reason.

~~~
otterley
The reason certain minorities are protected is in part because the reason for
discrimination is because of race, gender, or other attributes they were born
with and cannot change.

The choice of where to work is just that--a choice. Choices have consequences.
If you willingly accept continued association with a known group of bad
actors, it's reasonable that someone might judge your character poorly for
that choice.

~~~
mantas
As if majority of Uber workers thought "hey, I could offend women and do shit
there, I want to work for them!". And sure all programmers value workplace
image over technical challenges?

It's as reasonable to think ex-Uberist is douche as that ghetto-looking dude
stole a bicycle on the way to job interview. Possible? Yes. More likely than
average citizen? Yes. Reasonable?

If people would be (soft-)forced to steer clear from anyone who might look
like a bad actor, it'd suck big time. Want to take down opponents? Spread some
rumours and people are afraid to work with them. Or companies would be over-
the-top to look good instead of focusing on what they actually do. Github and
their diversity team comes to mind.

~~~
sgift
> And sure all programmers value workplace image over technical challenges?

No, but then they've made a decision and sometimes those come back to haunt
you. That said: I wouldn't dismiss someone from a position just because
they've worked at Uber, but I would ask "pointed questions" to quote the
article. At the end of the day you will have to work with that person and I'd
rather work with nice people than not.

------
linkregister
This should be marked as an opinion piece. I struggle to find the data to back
this article. Even the recruiting agency interviewed for the article gave a
wishy washy answer.

It may be unfair to make a "black mark" on every journalist at The Guardian,
but after the false "WhatsApp considered harmful" stories, I am unable to take
anything they print at face value. Response by moxie:
[https://whispersystems.org/blog/there-is-no-whatsapp-
backdoo...](https://whispersystems.org/blog/there-is-no-whatsapp-backdoor/)

~~~
itsthejb
The Guardian used to be a "serious" newspaper, but since they went after
markets outside of the UK, including online, they're more of a "classy
tabloid". Farming clickbait. A very unfortunate turn. Used to really enjoy
their culture content in the 90s

------
spudlyo
It would be tempting to vote no on an otherwise qualified candidate citing
"culture fit" who has Uber on their resume and a whiff of "bro dude" about
them. Ultimately though I hope I'd resist that temptation, because people
deserve the benefit of the doubt; even young, white, physically fit dudes who
enjoy sports and previously worked at Uber.

I've worked with some nerds who were awful mean-spirited tyrants, and some bro
dudes who were really kind and sweet.

~~~
sillysaurus3
_It would be tempting to vote no on an otherwise qualified candidate citing
"culture fit" who has Uber on their resume and a whiff of "bro dude" about
them. Ultimately though I hope I'd resist that temptation, because people
deserve the benefit of the doubt; even young, white, physically fit dudes who
enjoy sports and previously worked at Uber._

If you substitute the gender or the color of "young, white physically fit
dude" you get blatant racism or sexism.

If someone did something wrong, then hold that against them. Being biased
against someone's color or gender isn't ok.

~~~
spudlyo
_If you substitute the gender or the color of "young, white physically fit
dude" you get blatant racism or sexism._

I agree. If I did have a bias against white males I might consider it
_technically_ racism or sexism, but not blatant.

In my view it's simplistic to think of bias based on gender or race as sexism
or racism without considering the larger societal context. Can a historically
dominant gender/race in a given society feel the occasional isolated sting of
racism and/or sexism? I believe they can, but I also believe it's a false
equivalency to view that with the same lens as the often systemic and
institutionalized racism and sexism faced by those in the marginalized
minority.

~~~
ermir
Ah, so doing it against whites makes it okay then, because they are the
"dominant" race.

~~~
spudlyo
I think we're having an argument about semantics. I think it's a mistake to
conflate racism with prejudice. I believe it diminishes the concepts of racism
and sexism to invoke them in a non-systemic context.

~~~
ermir
When you change the meaning of racism to actually mean only institutional
racism, the behavior that the old meaning represented suddenly becomes much
more acceptable. In my opinion this shows a lack of moral clarity on the part
of the people who do this, either willingly or not, since it shows that the
reason they were opposed to racism was only because of the social prohibition
to whatever was thought to be racist, not to the act of racial prejudice
itself.

~~~
spudlyo
Excellent point. Racism and sexism are big ideas that operate on more than one
level. Thanks for the reminder that I was thinking about it a narrow way.

------
bgutierrez
Culture shapes how individuals behave, and people will change to accommodate
new cultures. They might come in with bad habits, but the only reason I would
look at their last company's behavior was if that person had been their early
or high enough to shape that culture.

~~~
Bartweiss
One really good point in this thread is that people leave companies for
cultural reasons as well as professional ones. Blackballing ex-Uber employees
hits not only the people who created that culture but also people who had the
integrity to leave _because of that culture_ , who are presumably quite good
candidates (culturally).

So yeah, I can't really imagine applying that judgement to people who never
had the time/position to shape the culture.

------
dandare
> “To be perfectly honest, I don’t want to work with someone who did well in
> that environment,” he said. “If you did well in that environment upholding
> those values, I probably don’t want to work with you.”

My faith in humanity has been instantly restored by 10% :)

------
Twirrim
Outside of the deplorable sexual harassment stuff, it wasn't the "hustle" that
bothered me in that infamous blog post

What bothered me was all the back stabbing. Those are strong black marks for
me against anyone that has worked in management in Uber.

------
employee8000
I'm being contacted around 3 times a day for the last couple of weeks from a
laundry list of companies so I don't think the article is true. Not all orgs
at uber have/had a bad culture and the engineering teams are fantastic. Many
people love working at Uber, but clearly something needs to change, and they
are, for the better.

~~~
kevinr
Oh, they know people are on the market. That's the vultures circling. They
also know they need to be on the lookout to disqualify you if you exhibit bad
behavior, so they're going to be very picky in the hiring.

~~~
employee8000
Rooting out assholes in interviews is even harder and less reliable than
evaluating programmers with whiteboard interviews. The SVP from Google passed
an extensive due diligence check, and some of the high performer assholes that
got fired hid themselves almost perfectly. Hopefully this environment is over
at this point but I'm readying my resume just in case.

~~~
snarf
Given that key HR people at Uber come from Google, is it possible that Uber
senior management actually knew about the issues surrounding their star SVP
hire from Google when they hired him and were OK with it until reporters were
tipped off due to current events and they started sniffing around? I am a
little dubious of Uber's narrative that they first found out about this from
reporters and fired him soon after.

------
ryandrake
Having worked at companies with varying degrees of "hustle" culture, I have to
say I prefer (and I know others who prefer) the hustle, the energy, the sense
of urgency, the culture of always being present and checked in. If you've got
in-born hustle, it's tough to work around people without it. Once lack of
hustle takes hold, it spreads like a virus through a company, and soon
everyone comes down with this "eh, we can always do it later" attitude about
everything. People start not taking deadlines seriously, start worrying more
about taking time to build consensus rather than being quick and decisive.
Roll in late to meetings, etc. You can even see it watching foot traffic--non-
hustlers physically walk slower through the halls. Companies that hustle
aren't for everyone but let's not condemn it. It's good to have a variety of
work cultures available because different personalities work better in
different environments.

Note the above rant doesn't excuse illegal or discriminatory behavior. I'm
just addressing the simplistic "hustle = bad" argument.

~~~
AstralStorm
You're misunderstanding hustle with commitment and energy. See, hustle is
urgency for sake of urgency at the expense of everything, including breaking
rules and social values.

Going without consensus is also one way companies (esp. small ones) implode or
do unethical and illegal things.

What is more, this hustling approach discounts brand perception and PR. We see
the effects. You may be fast, but if you damage your brand badly enough in the
process you might have as well not have done anything.

~~~
ryandrake
To me, hustle is simply energy/urgency even when nobody is looking. It doesn't
have to have a negative connotation.

~~~
crispyambulance
Unfortunately, we don't get to choose whether or not a word has a negative
connotation. "Hustle" suggests duplicity, using people and gaming the system
for selfish benefit.

~~~
ryandrake
I don't think the little league baseball coach encouraging his team to "let's
hustle out there guys!" is being duplicitous. It's a shame the word has
multiple meanings and that the one with the negative connotation is the one
that people always think of.

------
badusername
Blah - seems like a sensationalist clickbait article, just cashing in on the
current media cycle.

I'm honestly more shocked at the myopic discussion in this thread, quite
lacking in understanding the range of motivations of people who work there.
I'm a long-time engineering employee, and seen a lot of ups and downs. To
build a service that was used by a few thousand in one city to millions all
over the world has been one of the most exciting jobs I've had, with great
feats of engineering and operational execution. Numbers don't lie that we've
built a reliable service - the negative media cycles don't hurt the business.
There have been a ton of growing pains, with a lot of agenda-driven empire
builders, bro-ey-ness, and general lack of careful cultural development that
have contributed to the current situation, and left quite a few rankled
employees in its wake. Whether it will come out strong from this situation is
up to the strength of the leadership, and we'll see what the remedy holds.

FWIW, I have seen a huge uptick in recruiter inbounds in the last few weeks
(understandably), with all the best names Facebook, Google, Amazon and Tesla
on the list.

------
dep_b
I don't think everybody that works at Uber joined because of their hustle
culture, was part of that while working there or even knew about it while they
worked there. I've seen many companies in my life and I was always amazed
about some of the stories I heard at the water cooler about people I'd never
expect in places I never expected.

If you're not part of the water cooler circle, focus on your work and the
problems you are solving and have a nice bunch of direct colleagues and a
manager that's not a big jerk (to you and anybody you see him/her interact
with at least) you really might be surprised about hearing this stuff.

If you join Uber in 2017 or later then I feel you might deserve a stigma. But
somebody hacking on the API 10 hours per day and minding his own business? Not
so much.

------
kazinator
Befitting of Uber, they stole the "Uber way" and called it their own

"Develop an incomplete solution and beat them to the market" is, of course,
the Google Way, the Microsoft way, the Bell Labs way, the IBM way, ..."

Time to market is important.

 _“A lot of them have told me that they’re having a hard time finding
something new.”_

I'm not convinced that this is because they are tained by Uber. It could be
that the property "having worked at Uber" carries a statistical bias with
"hard to employ elsewhere" simply because perhaps Uber was blindly on-boarding
toms, dicks and harriets off the street. (Maybe the way they get drivers at
the bottom of the org chart permeates how they staff the rest of it.)

------
coryfklein
Bob: Worked at Uber for 3 years

Joe: Worked at LinkedIn for 3 years

With only this information, which person is more likely to engage in
backstabbing or sexual harassment?

With the information available to me, the answer seems clear: Bob

Can somebody explain the fault in my reasoning please?

~~~
istorical
There's nothing wrong with your reasoning, it's just called 'painting an
entire group for the sins of some subset". Or in other words, it means you're
prejudiced against Uber employees.

~~~
coryfklein
Are you saying we shouldn't engage in this kind of reasoning because of the
words used to describe it? Shouldn't reasoning be used based on its ability to
model the world accurately?

If the above reasoning is prejudice, does that make prejudice a good thing?

~~~
techthroway443
Real question is, if it's true can you still call that prejudice?

------
throw2016
This is simple to deal with. Uber has picked up a 'roguish' reputation.

This is how it plays out. In an year or 2 'tainted' management is ejected
replaced by new management with folks who have the right reputation and say
all the right things. They can then move into respectable territory pretty
quickly.

For now it suits the decision makers to play this out to their maximum
advantage.

------
crispyambulance
The "black mark" certainly doesn't apply to all employees. As one of the
recruiters indicated, Uber in the work history might prompt pointed behavioral
questioning of candidates.

I suspect it might be more of an issue for high-level execs and possibly
project/program managers, but you have to screen for assholery for those
titles regardless of where they come from.

------
digi_owl
I find myself "bemused" how while Uber was playing fast and loose with all
kinds of regulations they were just good buys disrupting a rotten old boys
system.

But now that accusations of sexual harassment at the office has been aired,
they are suddenly "unclean".

Almost makes one wonder if the whole "feminism/women's rights" terminology has
been hijacked and weaponized by some entity that could not care one bit about
actual women, but are using the terms and methods for social assassination
objectives.

------
menacingly
I keep waiting for the massive PR siege against Uber to fizzle out but it
apparently has marathon legs

~~~
comboy
It's amazing how much circle jerk around this is happening on HN, which
usually holds reasonably cold and rational views. I'm not saying that Uber is
doing good things but it definitely feels like an organized campaign that
successfully snowballed.

~~~
linkregister
I don't think it's organized. I've seen otherwise benign organizations and
individuals (I'm not saying Uber is benign) dragged through the mud and later
vindicated.

Many different publications pile on to vulnerable targets in order to catch up
with reader interest. See Fatty Arbuckle, Lindy Chamberlain.

------
ungzd
Blackmark-oriented culture is problem too.

------
atonse
30 years ago these same a __holes would 've gone to Wall Street. Now they go
to Silicon Valley Instead. No surprise that some companies get infected with
them as a result.

~~~
brennanc
That's a pretty gross generalisation based on one company. There are
definitely a few cases but the industry as a whole isn't comparable to Wall
Street by any means.

~~~
veli_joza
Your statement seems to imply you want to exempt Silicon Valley from gross
generalization, but still apply it to Wall Street companies?

~~~
adrenalinelol
It is probably a bit of an over-generalization, but let us not forget Wall St.
did crash the economy and no one at the top was held accountable.

~~~
untog
And why do you suppose that Silicon Valley will not crash the economy? It's
not implausible, with the arrival of increased automation, self-driving cars,
etc. that the economy will at least take a major hit as a result of Silicon
Valley innovation. And I'll wager a lot of the Valley will get very rich off
it, too - just like Wall Street.

~~~
mcguire
Hey, it happened on 2000. The only difference was that the dotcom crash didn't
have a load of consumer debt behind it.

~~~
thinkmilitant
I'm sure you were just speaking casually, but this was far from the only
difference. Biggest difference that comes to my mind is the lack of bailouts.

~~~
mcguire
The bailouts were a follow-on action.

Back in 2000, we had an asset bubble, primarily in tech stocks but also in
stocks generally. But the bubble was not primarily debt-fuelled (Thank you,
post-great-depression limits on margin loans!); when in burst, it had no
direct, lasting consequences. Sure, a lot of people felt less wealthy, which
caused a bit of a general slowdown, but the economy recovered fairly quickly.

In 2007, we had an asset bubble in the housing market, fuelled primarily by
consumer debt. When the bubble started bursting, consumers stopped being able
to get big loans, meaning they couldn't buy at those prices and couldn't
refinance their existing huge loans. Housing prices dropped, meaning even
fewer loans, more foreclosures, more houses on the market and lower prices.
Because consumer debt was also financing the rest of the economy, the collapse
of that and the ensuing pessimism put the binders on the whole economy, hard.

In the midst of this, the institutions that had been making the loans
discovered that the paper they had been shuffling around was actually
worthless, leaving them with many debts and few assets. The bailouts were
intended to do two things:

1\. Improve the balance sheets of the financial institutions, preventing them
from going bankrupt and falling over like a sack of doorknobs. (IMO, this was
ultimately both good and bad. Uncontrolled collapse would have been _bad,_ but
a restructuring and breakup of those firms is _still_ necessary or it's going
to happen again.)

2\. Increase the money supply, through the banks-make-loans-loans-go-into-
accounts-banks-make-loans cycle. This was necessary to avoid deflation and
support the overall economy. (Want to shoot an economy in the head? Think
inflation is bad? Check out deflation.) Unfortunately, banks weren't making
loans, so that didn't happen. Modern economic theory at its finest, ladies and
gentlemen. Oopsie.

I maintain that the big, primary difference is the amount of leverage applied
on the downside.

------
tatotato
It's worse when you have a black mark on your record for actually hustling.

