Seven voting members of Uber’s board, including CEO Travis Kalanick, will meet Sunday to consider management changes, according to media reports.
Emil Michael, Uber Technologies’ chief business officer, who joined the company in 2013, may leave Uber permanently or take a leave of absence, NBC News reports. Michael is considered one of CEO Travis Kalanick’s closest allies.
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The San Francisco-based company board will consider calls for firing top managers, based on results of an investigation by the law firm of former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder. The investigation, launched in February, examined sexual harassment by a female engineer and the company’s culture, Recode reported late Saturday.
Susan Fowler, a former Uber engineer, published a blog post detailing what she described as sexual harassment. She described systematic sexual harassment in which she and female co-workers were openly propositioned for sex and other “inappropriate behavior” by a supervisor. She claimed a lack of a response by top managers. Kalanick condemned the behavior and said he had been unaware of it. Fowler now works at Stripe, the digital payments company, Reuters reports.
Although the review made no recommendation about Travis Kalanick, 40, the board will discuss his taking time off from the company he founded and lead to becoming world’s most valuable venture-backed private firm. The ride-hailing company valued at about $70 billion.
Kalanick has developed a reputation as an abrasive leader, Reuters reports, and his approach has rubbed off on his company. He was captured on video berating an Uber driver.
in a statement following the video’s release Kalanick said: “I must fundamentally change as a leader and grow up.”
Arianna Huffington, Uber board member, said that the senior executive needed to change his leadership style from that of a “scrappy entrepreneur” to be more like a “leader of a major global company.”
Last week, Uber announced it had fired 20 employees for a variety of reasons and training and adopting new policies. Uber said the report findings considered 215 cases encompassing sexual harassment, discrimination, unprofessional behavior, bullying and other employee complaints.
