On Tuesday, Uber released its first diversity report—and many are criticizing, not applauding, the move.
The organization’s report starts off strong with a section on the initiatives it funds and its goals, including bringing more women and minorities into its fold:
We’re dedicating $3 million over the next three years to support organizations working to bring more women and underrepresented people into tech. This year, our recruiting team is also embarking on a college tour to recruit talented students at colleges across the country, including a number of Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs). Our employee resource groups play a huge role in all our recruiting events that are focused on hiring women and people of color at Uber.
Then, however, the report quickly dissolves into a string of disappointing diversity statistics and puns.
[RELATED: Engage employees though culture and communications.]
Many people lashed out at the names for Uber’s employee groups on Twitter and Facebook. The monikers included “Jewbers” and “Shalom” for Jewish staffers, “UberHUE” for black employees and “Los Ubers” for Hispanic team members.
Some comments echoed a general disbelief that Uber, which is facing a raft of problems from a sexist culture to a Waymo lawsuit, didn't steer staffers toward terminology that was guaranteed not to offend. Word choices have gotten Uber in hot water before. In a 2014 Esquire interview, CEO Travis Kalanick answered a question about whether the company's success had helped his social life with the quip, "We call that Boob-er."
Only 36.1 percent of women make up Uber’s overall employee base, and the number drops to 15.4 percent when looking at tech positions. In terms of ethnicity, 49.8 percent of the organization’s staff is white, and 30.9 are Asian—only 8.8 percent are black. In terms of tech positions, only 1 percent are black employees, and only 2.1 percent are Hispanic.
For leadership roles, the numbers are even worse.
Only 22 percent of women hold leadership positions, which drops to 11.3 percent when looking at those positions in the tech sector. Black and Hispanic employees hold 2.3 percent and .08 percent of leadership roles in the organization, respectively—and none of those are in tech.
Liane Hornsey, Uber’s senior vice president and chief human resources officer, and Travis Kalanick, the organization’s chief executive, said transparency was the push behind publishing the numbers—even though there’s much work left to do.
“We have to build more trust with our employees, and transparency will build that trust,” Ms. Hornsey said of the report.
In the past, Mr. Kalanick has resisted publishing a diversity report, current and former employees have said. In a statement on Tuesday, Mr. Kalanick said, “I know that we have been too slow in publishing our numbers—and that the best way to demonstrate our commitment to change is through transparency. And to make progress, it’s important we measure what matters.”
There’s a silver lining in solidarity: Uber’s numbers mirror the staff makeup of most tech organizations.
The New York Times reported:
According to Google’s most recent diversity report, for example, just 31 percent of its work force are women. Google also said 81 percent of its technical jobs were held by men, while 1 percent of its employees in the United States were black and 3 percent were Hispanic. Many of the numbers stack up roughly along the same lines at Apple and Facebook.
What do you think, PR Daily readers? Is the release of Uber’s numbers a move to make the organization more accountable—or a misstep in a string of bad branding choices?
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