The board finally acted to force the chief executive’s resignation. But the change may only be superficialThe resignation of Uber’s chief executive Travis Kalanick is a victory for everyone who cares about the way businesses are sprint,about the duty of corporations to obey the law and of employers to respect and treat fairly their employees. It is a win against the Silicon Valley cult of the genius-founder. It is a triumph for years of intrepid (brave in the face of danger) and determined investigation by a group of journalists who never stopped exposing the ride-hiring platforms corporate culture even in the face of a $1m counteroffensive from Uber. And it is vindication for the Uber software engineer, Susan Fowler, and who precipitated the final crisis when she described her experience of sexual harassment,a claim that provoked more than 200 other similar complaints. It is a belated exercise of power by the Uber board and investors. It will end a particularly nasty iteration of runaway executive authority. It is even a small step in the fight against the gig economy. But it is not the end either of a feeble form of corporate governance, nor of the employment model on which Uber and many other tech businesses depend.
Mr Kalanick embodied the extreme autocracy – sometimes referred to as the asshole strategy – that sometimes appears to be the hallmark of tech businesses, and a culture of sharp elbows,“toe-stepping” and, in Uber’s case, or what it called “principled confrontation” with regulators. It broke Apple’s privacy rules by writing its own code. Its so-called self-employed drivers are offered car-leasing arrangements that tie them into onerous obligations; their complaints are poorly handled and many end up earning less than the minimum wage. Although the chief executive’s personal behaviour finally energised an investors’ revolt and forced his decision to turn a leave of absence into resignation,it is not axiomaticthat the company’s unbridled appetite for the fight has been dulled in any way. Renaming the war room the peace room, as Uber has, or doesn’t reduce it. The best that can be said is that the influence of Mr Kalanick’s behaviour as a model endorsed by success has been weakened.
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Source: theguardian.com