Uber Seeing Employees Look To Leave Over Culture Fit Issues

Uber employees may be losing faith in the startup’s executives, with The Financial Times reporting that recruiters in the Bay Area, as well as executives at competing companies, are seeing an increase in job applications from Uber workers.

According to the report, Uber is taking a hit from all the bad news it has faced in the last few weeks, which has resulted in workers looking at other options in addition to working for the startup, which was once a coveted place of employment.

“I have seen quite a few people who have been looking to leave Uber,” said one recruiter in the report. “One of the main reasons is lack of faith in senior leadership.” According to the unnamed recruiter, the number of resumes he has received from Uber employees increased last week after two ex-Uber workers posted complaints about sexual harassment and sexism on social media. The recruiter said he has gotten more resumes from Uber workers in one week than in all of February.

The Financial Times noted it must be bad for employees, since leaving the taxi hailing app company often means they are giving up their restricted stocks or stock options, which are potentially worth hundreds of thousands — even millions — of dollars. The report noted a typical middle manager job gets on average restricted stock units worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, which vests over four years.

“Historically, it has been incredibly difficult to recruit from Uber, which partly has to do with people being unwilling to leave their stock options on the table,” said Guillaume Champagne, president at SCGC Executive Search, in the report. “From a purely financial perspective, Uber would need to become an awful place for them to leave.”

Champagne said he has seen a 5 percent to 10 percent increase in the number of workers who want to leave, largely because of culture fit issues. “To be fair, people typically know what they are getting into when they join Uber. They know it is a very male-dominated, high-octane, investment banking type of culture,” he added.