Uber President Jeff Jones is hitting the brakes at the ride-hailing business, leaving the company less than a year after he joined its ranks.
The former Target marketing chief’s departure comes amid a flurry of controversies at Uber, which includes multiple sexual harassment allegations.
“We want to thank Jeff for his six months at the company and wish him all the best,” Uber said in a statement confirming Jones’ resignation.
According to sources with the company, the departure is effective immediately.
“In 6 months, he made an important impact on the company — from his focus on being driver obsessed to delivering our first brand reputation study, which will help set our course in the coming months and year,” Chief Executive Travis Kalanick wrote in a company-wide email.
Uber announced earlier this month that it was planning to hire a chief operating officer — a new position — to help address the company’s recent problems. It is unclear whether the new position influenced Jones’ decision, as he oversaw operations as president and was second only Kalanick.
“After we announced our intention to hire a COO, Jeff came to the tough decision that he doesn’t see his future at Uber,” Kalanick added in the email.
Jones was also in charge of customer support and marketing.
The ride-sharing company hired Jones away last year from Target Corp., where he was in charge of marketing. Uber then faced a number of bad PR revelations over the past couple months, including a #DeleteUber social media campaign.
From sexual harassment allegations and the CEO’s involvement in Trump’s business advisory group to Kalanick’s recorded argument with an Uber driver and claims that the company uses its data to stalk celebrities, the company has had to put out a number of in-house fires.
Most notably, it has had to battle assertions of sexual harassment in from a blog post titled “Reflecting On One Very, Very Strange Year At Uber.” In the post, a prominent former engineer at Uber, Susan Fowler, described the company as “an organization in complete, unrelenting chaos.” She alleged that she had been propositioned for sex and was blocked from advancement and that her and colleagues’ sexual harassment allegations fell on deaf ears at Uber’s human resources department.
In response, the company hired former Attorney General Eric Holder to “conduct an independent review into the specific issues relating to the workplace environment raised by Susan Fowler, as well as diversity and inclusion at Uber more broadly,” according to a memo sent by Kalanick.
The tech company is undergoing quite a few personnel changes this month, as it asked engineering executive Amit Singhai to resign after discovering claims of sexual harassment at his previous company, Google. Uber’s vice president of product and growth, Ed Baker, also left the company this month, according to Recode.
Jones did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
