HR boss the latest of Uber’s top brass to fall

UBER Technologies’ head of human resources (HR) has resigned, becoming the latest high-profile executive to leave the ride-hailing giant just emerging from a year of internal upheaval.

Liane Hornsey’s exit came after an anonymous employee, emailing Uber’s whistle-blower account and chief legal officer Tony West, threatened to go public with grievances if the company didn’t take action. The whistle-blower accused Hornsey of dismissing internal allegations of racial discrimination.

Chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi announced Hornsey’s departure in a staff email.

Her resignation came just after she led an offsite gathering for HR employees on Tuesday.

“I know this comes a little out of the blue for some of you, but I have been thinking about this for a while,” Hornsey said in an email to her team.

Uber declined to comment, while Hornsey wasn’t immediately available for comment.

Hornsey arrived at the world’s largest ride-hailing company in January last year, just a month before former Uber software engineer Susan Fowler published an explosive blog post chronicling the sexual harassment that she faced at the cab e-hailing company.

In June that year, Uber cofounder Travis Kalanick resigned as the chief executive amid a number of scandals, including accusations that Uber fostered a hostile workplace culture.

Hornsey had initially defended Kalanick and the company, only to later promise that Uber would reform under a new chief executive.

That made her a divisive figure among employees who either thought Uber had changed too much, and others who reckoned it had changed too little.

For his part, Khosrowshahi praised Hornsey’s leadership during her 18 months at the company. – Bloomberg