Uber faces backlash from some employees over Kalanick's exit

Uber CEO Travis Kalanick may have resigned, but some of his employees aren't having it.
More than 1,100 Uber employees have signed a petition asking the company's board of directors to reinstate their recently ousted  boss, according to reports. Uber has more than 12,000 employees worldwide. 

"Travis should return to Uber in an operational role," read the note to Uber's board, which was obtained by Axios. "This magnitude of a response was unexpected and should not be ignored. What started as simple note to my closest co-workers turned into a petition spanning hundreds of offices and teams, and has yet to be seen by a majority of employees."

Recode published what it described was an internal email that encouraged employees to sign the petition: “Nobody is perfect, but I fundamentally believe (Kalanick) can evolve into the leader Uber needs today and that he’s critical to its future success. I want the Board to hear from Uber employees that it’s made the wrong decision in pressuring Travis to leave and that he should be reinstated in an operational role.”

And Buzzfeed offered an anonymous screenshot of a message to Uber employees that fiercely defended Kalanick and suggested that the company would not achieve its goals without him at the helm. "Uber is TK and TK is Uber," read the note. "Without him I don't see any other leader doing a job as good as him, external or internal."
Uber, asked to comment, gave a statement it had shared with employees: "As you'd expect, the emotions around Travis’ decision are intense. We understand that, and we want all of you to know that he did not make this decision lightly.

Stepping back now was his way of putting Uber first, as he always has. Travis gave more to this company than anyone. He had a deep and meaningful impact on countless."
Kalanick resigned late Tuesday after being pressured by some of the companies' largest shareholders. The CEO and co-founder of the ride-hailing company was on leave grieving the death of his mother and had anticipated coming back to the company. 

But in the wake of a series of scandals that trained a harsh spotlight on everything from the company's sexist culture to its questionable business practices, stakeholders demanded Kalanick leave as part of an ongoing overhaul at the company.

The focus now at Uber includes implementing recommendations from an internal investigation into its culture, replacing some board members and adding new ones, and firing employees whose behavior crossed the line.

Kalanick's personality was said to infuse the company, from his penchant for late night jam sessions to a take-no-prisoners style of operations. But that approach also fostered a culture that yielded an environment in which some women, including whistle blower Susan Fowler, were not only ignored when they reported inappropriate behavior, but warned they could be professionally punished for doing so. 

By asking Kalanick to step aside, the board of directors is able to hire a new CEO with a fresh senior management team that can ideally rebrand Uber in the eyes of investors, current and prospective employees, and consumers. 
But some change management experts also warn that completely ditching a founder risks removing a vital part of a start-up's DNA. It is this issue that some employees are focusing on in supporting their former leader, according a few Facebook posts.

"This move is probably the best move for Uber and for Travis in the short term, given alI that has been happening lately," wrote Frederique Dame, who identified herself on Facebook as a former Uber employee.
"However, I don't think one can find someone with Travis' vision and commitment to the mission to drive the company long-term," she wrote. "We've seen the demise of Yahoo! with a succession of CEOs who didn't get the soul of the company, and we've seen the rise of Apple with Steve Jobs' comeback."

Uber employee Margaret-Ann Seger, whose LinkedIn profile describes her as a product manager for international growth, wrote that she was "angry, sad, flustered, confused, but mostly just heartbroken. The only appropriate thing to say right now is thank you, Travis, thank you for inspiring not only your own employees but an entire generation of entrepreneurs. Thank you for inspiring us to think bigger, faster, and higher-impact than anyone has ever dared to think before."

Against these calls for his return, the brew of controversy over Kalanick's tenure wasn't over. Some women in tech have started to criticize the continued employee of Chief Technology Officer Thuan Pham, named as one of the executives who looked the other way when Fowler spoke to management about sexual harassment from her boss.

"Wondering why there isn't more fuss about the CTO still being at uber, given that so many of the problems came from engineering org," tweeted Amy Nguyen, a software engineer at Pinterest. "It sends a message that as an industry we value men in technical roles more than we value the safety of women,” said Julie Ann Horvath, an advocate of diversity in tech, told The Guardian.

Then on Thursday, dancer Erica Holland sued Uber, alleging her driver pulled her hair and slipped his hand under her skirt after a ride in Los Angeles on June 9. Holland is being represented by high-profile lawyer Lisa Bloom, who in a press conference Thursday announced a list of reforms she would asking Uber to undertake on behalf of its female ridership.