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Engineer at Uber describes her encounters with sexism

Amber Thomas
Interesting, but rather sad account of life at Uber for a female engineer. Susan Fowler describes her experiences with sexism and the consequences it had on her career. Shocking to see how unhelpful the HR team were throughout her time with the company and depressing to think that things were not handled better than this in the 21st century! The whole article is worth reading, but a couple of things mentioned were particularly jarring to see...
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"The HR rep began the meeting by asking me if I had noticed that *I* was the common theme in all of the reports I had been making, and that if I had ever considered that I might be the problem. I pointed out that everything I had reported came with extensive documentation and I clearly wasn't the instigator (or even a main character) in the majority of them - she countered by saying that there was absolutely no record in HR of any of the incidents I was claiming I had reported (which, of course, was a lie, and I reminded her I had email and chat records to prove it was a lie)....When I pointed out how few women were in Site Reliability Engineering (SRE), she [the HR representative!] recounted with a story about how sometimes certain people of certain genders and ethnic backgrounds were better suited for some jobs than others, so I shouldn't be surprised by the gender ratios in engineering. Our meeting ended with her berating me about keeping email records of things, and told me it was unprofessional to report things [such as screen shots of the team manager propositioning me for sex] via email to HR."

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"Performance review season came around, and I received a great review with no complaints whatsoever about my performance. I waited a couple of months, and then attempted to transfer again. When I attempted to transfer, I was told that my performance review and score had been changed after the official reviews had been calibrated, and so I was no longer eligible for transfer. When I asked management why my review had been changed after the fact (and why hadn't they let me know that they'd changed it?), they said that I didn't show any signs of an upward career trajectory. I pointed out that I was publishing a book with O'Reilly, speaking at major tech conferences, and doing all of the things that you're supposed to do to have an "upward career trajectory", but they said it didn't matter and I needed to prove myself as an engineer. I was stuck where I was. 


I asked them to change my performance review back. My manager said that the new negative review I was given had no real-world consequences, so I shouldn't worry about it. But I went home and cried that day, because even aside from impacts to my salary and bonuses, it did have real-world consequences - significant consequences that my management chain was very well aware of. I was enrolled in a Stanford CS graduate program, sponsored by Uber, and Uber only sponsored employees who had high performance scores. Under both of my official performance reviews and scores, I qualified for the program, but after this sneaky new negative score I was no longer eligible. It turned out that keeping me on the team made my manager look good, and I overheard him boasting to the rest of the team that even though the rest of the teams were losing their women engineers left and right, he still had some on his team."


Read the full blog here: https://www.susanjfowler.com/blog/2017/2/19/reflecting-on-one-very-strange-year-at-uber


Although sexism is (sadly) all too often a common occurrence in many workplaces, I would hope that HR teams would be more supportive and proactive in tackling these issues. Has anyone encountered similar issues with feeling unsupported by HR or management when encountering similar experiences?

  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member
    How very interesting!!
  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member
    I saw another article about Uber pop up this morning: https://medium.com/@amyvertino/my-name-is-not-amy-i-am-an-uber-survivor-c6d6541e632f#.hvp0z6mce


    This article also highlights incidents of racism and bullying men who didn't participate in the party culture. The writer suggests that the poor attitude towards women trickles down from the top, but I'd go as far as saying that the culture at Uber is rotten to the core. I have never used Uber and I am not about to start.
  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member
    I have never used them either and never will after so much bad press on them.  Somebody recently reccomended that I get the app...  No chance!

    four scandels in ten days suggests that something is very worng in the way that the company operates.  



  • 0

    David Houssein:

    I saw another article about Uber pop up this morning: https://medium.com/@amyvertino/my-name-is-not-amy-i-am-an-uber-survivor-c6d6541e632f#.hvp0z6mce


    This article also highlights incidents of racism and bullying men who didn't participate in the party culture. The writer suggests that the poor attitude towards women trickles down from the top, but I'd go as far as saying that the culture at Uber is rotten to the core. I have never used Uber and I am not about to start.




    I'm shocked and disgusted by Uber's managers and management. It's good that the information is now public - these managers and the Uber management can now be held to public scrutiny and accountability. I hope "Amy Vertino" will find the right support she clearly needs to help her find her real self again and regain her self-worth.

  • 0
    Specifically regarding HR being unhelpful (actually downright hostile), as a union rep one fo the the things that I find very frustrating is people not understanding the role of HR.  People think HR is there to support them and protect their rights, unfortunately this is not true, some individual HR people might do that but it's not the job of HR.  Once you get past the basic transactional stuff (payroll, on boarding, exit processing &c) HR have one job and one job only, to make sure that the organisation doesn't get sued for employment issues.  That means that they set up policies and procedures for managers to follow that will keep them just the right side of legal so if they break the law the organisation can say, "They didn't follow procedure" and be covered; they run 'Equalities' and 'Sensitivity' training (or these days provide eLearning packages) so when an employee or manager goes against those things the organisation can say, "They had been trained in this but chose to not follow their training" and be covered; they set up Employee Assistrance Programmes so distressed employees can be sign posted to CBT or Mindfullness coaching so when an employee makes a complaint or commits suicide (in construction, for example, more workers now die from suicide than from accidents) the organisation can say, "We do everything we can to support our staff, including with issues in their personal life, but they hadn't accessed the services" and be covered; when an employee makes a complaints, they turn the complaint back on the complainer and support management in removing that person;  if the complainer cannot be removed then they support senior management in identifying a scapegoat;  if there is no scapegoat then, as a last resort, they draw up a confidential 'Settlement Agreement' and get the complainer to leave in return for some cash and a good reference.


    Individuals in HR can be helpful and supportive, but it's not the job of HR to be so.  Often the best you can hope for is some cash and a good reference so you can find somewhere better to work and hope enough good people will leave your old employer that they go under.
  • 0

    Stephen Booth:


    Individuals in HR can be helpful and supportive, but it's not the job of HR to be so. 




    Sad but true. Yet very frustrating to see such extreme examples of unhelpfulness and lack of empathy in these stories. Although the HR team may primarily be there to protect the interests of the employer, it does not seem like those interests are protected by ignoring the facts, blaming the victim or not keeping records of events/disputes. But... people are people at the end of the day, and some people (whatever their profession) will always be either too jaded (or perhaps too inundated with similar complaints!) to care beyond the boundaries of their job description. What is sad to me is that attitudes still exist in this day and age that seem more at home in the last century than at the cutting edge of technology and innovation. The fact that the attitudes were so prevalent (found in engineering teams, the HR team) and at various levels (colleagues, managers, senior management) shows that it isn't just one or two bad apples in the barrel, but that the whole barrel is rotten to the core! There will always be one or two people that you don't see eye-to-eye with in life, but when the issues are systemic in the company culture as these appear to be, then as you say, I think most people in that situation would indeed wish for "some cash and a good reference" (and for the company to go under!)

  • 0
    So...Employment laws, designed to help create a thriving economy and protect employees (and employers to a certain degree) can be intrepreted and deployed to serve the interests of a select few...?
  • Former Community Member
    0 Former Community Member
    I think that's quite a cynical view of HR. I don't doubt that what you describe is common at many (especially large) organisations, but I've had nothing but a good experience with the HR team I deal with. I have friends who've had very mixed experiences and some might agree with you.


    Speaking as a manager, I've had support at being better at my job (I demand more of myself than doing just enough to not get sued!) and I've not had any trouble arranging training for staff who want to get better at their jobs (again, it's because they want to not because they need to). There's an awful lot more that they do to support staff, but you probably don't hear about it because of confidentiality. Let's not tar all HR with the same brush!


    Clear Uber's HR department are failing even to achieve what you cynically describe as their function! They've done nothing to protect the image of the company and it's only a matter of time before they find themselves in some serious hot water.
  • 0
    Another day, another Uber story...


    This one discusses the sexism that came from a female software engineer's female manager. Keala writes:
    "I had a meeting with Mark about a month ago to discuss the transition to his team, and Tina [my line manager] was there; she likes to be at all meetings and know everything that is going on. At the time, Mark was in the middle of a dealing with a company outage and couldn’t speak for long. He was noticeably stressed out — he actually stepped out of the outage room to meet with me, so I can’t imagine the stress he was going through.



    The next day, Tina and I had a 1:1 and she asks, “How do you think the meeting with Mark went yesterday?” I told her it would have been better if he wasn’t distracted by the incident, but I’m glad he chose to meet with me. He’s an extremely busy guy and really good at what he does and I am beyond excited to work with him and his team — they are awesome. She continued, “Did you notice that he wasn’t really making eye contact with you? What do you think of that?” So I said, “He was in the middle of an incident and seemed very stressed out, but other than that nothing seemed strange.” I was stunned by the follow-up question: “Do you think it was because you were wearing a tank top?”



    The blog goes on to echo Susan Fowler's experience of HR being unhelpful and not stepping in. Read more at: https://medium.com/@contactkeala/sexism-at-uber-from-female-management-uberstory-238874075bbb#.jopmpspy5

     

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