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Whistleblower: My Journey to Silicon Valley and Fight for Justice at Uber
The unbelievable true story of the young woman who faced down one of the most valuable startups in Silicon Valley history–and what came after.
In 2017, twenty-six-year-old Susan Fowler published a blog post detailing the sexual harassment and retaliation she'd experienced as an entry-level engineer at Uber. The post went viral, leading not only to the ouster of Uber's CEO and twenty other employees, but "starting a bonfire on creepy sexual behavior in Silicon Valley that . . . spread to Hollywood and engulfed Harvey Weinstein" (Maureen Dowd, The New York Times).
When Susan decided to share her story, she was fully aware of the consequences most women faced for speaking out about harassment prior to the #MeToo era. But, as her inspiring memoir, Whistleblower, reveals, this courageous act was entirely consistent with Susan's young life so far: a life characterized by extraordinary determination, a refusal to accept things as they are, and the desire to do what is good and right. Growing up in poverty in rural Arizona, she was denied a formal education—yet went on to obtain an Ivy League degree. When she was told, after discovering the pervasive culture of sexism, harassment, racism, and abuse at Uber, that she was the problem, she banded together with other women to try to make change. When that didn't work, she went public. She could never have anticipated the lengths to which Uber would go in its efforts to intimidate and discredit her, the impact her words would have on Silicon Valley—and the world—or how they would set her on a course toward finally achieving her dreams.
The moving story of a woman's lifelong fight to do what she loves—despite repeatedly being told no or treated as less-than—Whistleblower is both a riveting read and a source of inspiration for anyone seeking to stand up against inequality in their own workplace.
In 2017, twenty-six-year-old Susan Fowler published a blog post detailing the sexual harassment and retaliation she'd experienced as an entry-level engineer at Uber. The post went viral, leading not only to the ouster of Uber's CEO and twenty other employees, but "starting a bonfire on creepy sexual behavior in Silicon Valley that . . . spread to Hollywood and engulfed Harvey Weinstein" (Maureen Dowd, The New York Times).
When Susan decided to share her story, she was fully aware of the consequences most women faced for speaking out about harassment prior to the #MeToo era. But, as her inspiring memoir, Whistleblower, reveals, this courageous act was entirely consistent with Susan's young life so far: a life characterized by extraordinary determination, a refusal to accept things as they are, and the desire to do what is good and right. Growing up in poverty in rural Arizona, she was denied a formal education—yet went on to obtain an Ivy League degree. When she was told, after discovering the pervasive culture of sexism, harassment, racism, and abuse at Uber, that she was the problem, she banded together with other women to try to make change. When that didn't work, she went public. She could never have anticipated the lengths to which Uber would go in its efforts to intimidate and discredit her, the impact her words would have on Silicon Valley—and the world—or how they would set her on a course toward finally achieving her dreams.
The moving story of a woman's lifelong fight to do what she loves—despite repeatedly being told no or treated as less-than—Whistleblower is both a riveting read and a source of inspiration for anyone seeking to stand up against inequality in their own workplace.
272 pages, Hardcover
First published February 18, 2020
213 people are currently reading
5449 people want to read
About the author
Susan Fowler
25 books367 followersSusan Rigetti is an author, screenwriter, and the former technology op-ed editor at The New York Times. She has been named a "Person of the Year" by Time, the Financial Times, and the Webby Awards, and has appeared on Fortune's "40 Under 40" list, Vanity Fair's New Establishment list, Marie Claire's New Guard list, the Bloomberg 50, the Upstart 50, the Recode 100, and more. She is the author of a book on computer programming that has been implemented by companies across Silicon Valley, and the critically acclaimed memoir Whistleblower.
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August 8, 2022
Hell hath no fury like a woman confronted with unfair treatment, bullying, and sexual discrimination.
In "Whistleblower", Susan Fowler blows her whistle loud and proud.
In addition to "whistling" about the unjust treatment received at Uber, UPenn, PubNub, and Plaid, Fowler also shares her truth-is stranger-than-fiction rags to riches story with readers.
Fowler was raised and homeschooled in rural Arizona, the second of seven children. Her father was an impoverished preacher, and many times there was no money for food or running water.
Through grit and determination, Fowler attended college and eventually landed her coveted role as an Uber software engineer.
Fowler's memoir was a quick, inspirational, and powerful read.
I listened to the audiobook that was narrated by the author.
I always love it when authors narrate their own memoirs, and Fowler did a superb job with the narration.
Special thanks to my GR friend Brandice for recommending this book.
In "Whistleblower", Susan Fowler blows her whistle loud and proud.
In addition to "whistling" about the unjust treatment received at Uber, UPenn, PubNub, and Plaid, Fowler also shares her truth-is stranger-than-fiction rags to riches story with readers.
Fowler was raised and homeschooled in rural Arizona, the second of seven children. Her father was an impoverished preacher, and many times there was no money for food or running water.
Through grit and determination, Fowler attended college and eventually landed her coveted role as an Uber software engineer.
Fowler's memoir was a quick, inspirational, and powerful read.
I listened to the audiobook that was narrated by the author.
I always love it when authors narrate their own memoirs, and Fowler did a superb job with the narration.
Special thanks to my GR friend Brandice for recommending this book.
August 4, 2022
I listened to the audiobook of Whistleblower by Susan Fowler, who joined Uber as a site engineer in 2015. While there, she struggled with gender discrimination, harassment, an unfair boss, and an HR team that didn’t seem to take any of it seriously when she attempted to report said issues.
In 2017, after she had left Uber and the company began receiving more public scrutiny for its rumored behavior and questionable activities, Susan wrote a blog post detailing her yearlong experience at Uber, which went viral.
Listening to Whistleblower though, I was most shocked and enraged on Susan’s behalf about the way UPenn treated her as a student, before her career in tech, when she raised concerns about the mental health and well-being of a classmate. The “choices” the school gave Susan were ridiculous, unethical, and I believe, are a prime example of why mental health issues often remain quiet and go unaddressed.
Susan has faced a lot of adversity in her life, beginning with her childhood in Arizona. She was one of several siblings and began working at a young age to help support her family. I admire her drive to overcome these struggles and to speak up for herself and others — This is often easier said than done and requires a courageous commitment to doing what’s right which isn’t always what’s popular.
This year, Susan published her first fiction book Cover Story, under her married name, Susan Rigetti. I couldn’t put it down and look forward to seeing what she writes next.
In 2017, after she had left Uber and the company began receiving more public scrutiny for its rumored behavior and questionable activities, Susan wrote a blog post detailing her yearlong experience at Uber, which went viral.
Listening to Whistleblower though, I was most shocked and enraged on Susan’s behalf about the way UPenn treated her as a student, before her career in tech, when she raised concerns about the mental health and well-being of a classmate. The “choices” the school gave Susan were ridiculous, unethical, and I believe, are a prime example of why mental health issues often remain quiet and go unaddressed.
Susan has faced a lot of adversity in her life, beginning with her childhood in Arizona. She was one of several siblings and began working at a young age to help support her family. I admire her drive to overcome these struggles and to speak up for herself and others — This is often easier said than done and requires a courageous commitment to doing what’s right which isn’t always what’s popular.
This year, Susan published her first fiction book Cover Story, under her married name, Susan Rigetti. I couldn’t put it down and look forward to seeing what she writes next.
February 21, 2020
Later in the memoir, Fowler relates a seemingly minor anecdote, one that might seem insignificant given the level of mistreatment she's experienced during her time in Silicon Valley. Basically, Uber ordered all the engineers on her team leather jackets. Just like the other employees, Folwer provided her sizing information and promptly forgot about it. Shortly afterwards, she receives an email explaining that because there were so few female engineers, the company wasn't able to get the bulk discount, so they were only ordering male jackets. Furious, Fowler protested the decision, pointing out that the company could surely afford the few hundred dollars to show respect to the female employees. Naturally, management put up resistance, which was so ridiculous that she couldn't help but laugh about it with her female colleagues. As she puts it, "It was an absurd situation, filled with such ridiculously blatant, banal sexism, that neither of us could believe it was really happening."
While Folwer's book is fascinating in several respects - it is, among other things, a story about how a working-class women learns to survive in a world of privilege - it is most powerfully a chronicle of "blatant, banal sexism," the endless daily humiliations that grind people down and lead them to accept the system. Because of our nature as people, we tend to focus on the monsters, the exceptionally horrible people that are so bankrupt it is hard to muster anything kind to say about them. And, of course, Whistleblower has plenty of monstrous figures. In her time in the physics department at the University of Pennsylvania, a female graduate adviser deceives her into thinking she wants to help her navigate a sexual harassment claim, only to use it as an excuse to deny her a Philosophy MA that she had earned through her coursework. At a small tech firm, a manager goes on a diatribe about how you can't trust female employees because all they want is to have babies. Her boss at Uber propositions on the first day, which he apparently did to almost his female colleagues. But the monsters are not what I found most overwhelming. Rather, it was the mundane, everyday sexism that seemed to be endlessly excused by other people.
Just to give you a few examples - and this list could probably stretch across several pages - here are some things just briefly mentioned, almost as an aside to the main narrative:
- The physics lab where she worked as an undergraduate didn't have a female restroom.
- Her undergraduate adviser tried to kick her out of the physics program, simply because she hadn't passed her introductory courses.
- A doctor from student health services propositioned her over social media.
- She discovers, at one point, that she's being paid considerably less than her male colleagues at her first job.
- She is continually told that white men stick around in technology companies because they are better engineers.
- She is given a patronizingly simple programming problem during her Uber job interview, which she assumes is because her interviewers didn't trust her expertise.
The book is an inspiring portrait of a woman who decided to take on the system despite considerable risk to both herself and her family. However, it's also a portrait of systematic discrimination and how it operates through continually emphasizing a person's outsider status until they reach the point of exhaustion. The smaller humiliations are what create a space for the larger monstrosities. For those of us who want to be allies, it means we must do more than just call out the Harvey Weinsteins. We also need to focus on the little microaggressions in our daily lives, such as the snide remarks and "harmless jokes" that often are let slide. Especially for those of us who work with young people, it means modeling how a different world might look (and perhaps even more importantly, being honest about the world that exists, so they can work toward making a change).
Bottom line: great, inspiring book. Highly recommended for anyone interested in the technology industry.
While Folwer's book is fascinating in several respects - it is, among other things, a story about how a working-class women learns to survive in a world of privilege - it is most powerfully a chronicle of "blatant, banal sexism," the endless daily humiliations that grind people down and lead them to accept the system. Because of our nature as people, we tend to focus on the monsters, the exceptionally horrible people that are so bankrupt it is hard to muster anything kind to say about them. And, of course, Whistleblower has plenty of monstrous figures. In her time in the physics department at the University of Pennsylvania, a female graduate adviser deceives her into thinking she wants to help her navigate a sexual harassment claim, only to use it as an excuse to deny her a Philosophy MA that she had earned through her coursework. At a small tech firm, a manager goes on a diatribe about how you can't trust female employees because all they want is to have babies. Her boss at Uber propositions on the first day, which he apparently did to almost his female colleagues. But the monsters are not what I found most overwhelming. Rather, it was the mundane, everyday sexism that seemed to be endlessly excused by other people.
Just to give you a few examples - and this list could probably stretch across several pages - here are some things just briefly mentioned, almost as an aside to the main narrative:
- The physics lab where she worked as an undergraduate didn't have a female restroom.
- Her undergraduate adviser tried to kick her out of the physics program, simply because she hadn't passed her introductory courses.
- A doctor from student health services propositioned her over social media.
- She discovers, at one point, that she's being paid considerably less than her male colleagues at her first job.
- She is continually told that white men stick around in technology companies because they are better engineers.
- She is given a patronizingly simple programming problem during her Uber job interview, which she assumes is because her interviewers didn't trust her expertise.
The book is an inspiring portrait of a woman who decided to take on the system despite considerable risk to both herself and her family. However, it's also a portrait of systematic discrimination and how it operates through continually emphasizing a person's outsider status until they reach the point of exhaustion. The smaller humiliations are what create a space for the larger monstrosities. For those of us who want to be allies, it means we must do more than just call out the Harvey Weinsteins. We also need to focus on the little microaggressions in our daily lives, such as the snide remarks and "harmless jokes" that often are let slide. Especially for those of us who work with young people, it means modeling how a different world might look (and perhaps even more importantly, being honest about the world that exists, so they can work toward making a change).
Bottom line: great, inspiring book. Highly recommended for anyone interested in the technology industry.
February 19, 2020
She presents herself as the only one in the world who has ever struggled to reach success. Too much ego in this prose. Even as a memior, it's too self important. It's great to hear the female experience in tech, however, and I'm glad I read it. It's just not my prefered tone.
February 22, 2020
The Uber blog post from several years ago left a big impression on me, as I was just emerging from my own experience with a toxic work atmosphere, harassment and issues with the Title IX office in a physics department. It was at a time when such things were not often discussed publicly, so that one learned by stumbling through the mess oneself. I barely knew what harassment was until it happened to me, and I was also naive to believe that I should trust people who told me they would help me (including a lawyer working for the university, not for me). Much of what Fowler writes here about harassment in physics and tech really resonates with me. There are details that go well beyond the blog post, from her childhood background growing up in poverty in Arizona to additional information about her time at Uber (for instance the atmosphere was so toxic there that another employee committed suicide). Fowler additionally recounts some harassment that was handled terribly by the Title IX office at UPenn while she was studying physics there, which ultimately led her to leave physics. The gaslighting from both the Title IX office at UPenn and HR at Uber almost seems unreal until you experience such a thing yourself; the fact that she was additionally stalked by private investigators after writing the blog post is completely terrifying and goes beyond anything I have experienced.
I found this to be a well-written, important recounting of issues that push women out of STEM and tech. Thanks to brave women like Fowler, the next generation will at least know about and be better prepared for these issues when they enter the field, and with any luck be able to avoid them altogether.
I found this to be a well-written, important recounting of issues that push women out of STEM and tech. Thanks to brave women like Fowler, the next generation will at least know about and be better prepared for these issues when they enter the field, and with any luck be able to avoid them altogether.
November 26, 2020
An absolutely necessary, very approachable (but still emotionally devastating, so be warned) read about sexism and sexual harassment.
February 19, 2020
I devoured this book in 48 hours, and, TLDR: you should too.
Susan’s blog post blowing the whistle on Uber’s horrific workplace culture in 2017 set in motion changes and tough conversations not just at the ride-sharing startup, but across Silicon Valley and beyond.
Her memoir tells the full story of what happened at Uber in much greater detail, but it would be diminishing to say that this is what this book is about.
It’s so much more.
This is an account of someone not taking no for an answer; of someone unrelentingly driven in the pursuit of knowledge, education and self-actualisation; of someone taking and reclaiming power in so many different ways. Susan’s life story is story enough.
I reckon I’ve become a bit numb to horrific stories of startup (and academic) culture, and so I wasn’t all that shocked by Susan’s experience, but the matter-of-fact account, displayed with such clarity, was a joy (if you can say that about problematic stories) to read.
This book was so inspiring, so quick to fly through, and left me pondering many questions about speaking up, power and lifelong learning.
Brilliant.
Susan’s blog post blowing the whistle on Uber’s horrific workplace culture in 2017 set in motion changes and tough conversations not just at the ride-sharing startup, but across Silicon Valley and beyond.
Her memoir tells the full story of what happened at Uber in much greater detail, but it would be diminishing to say that this is what this book is about.
It’s so much more.
This is an account of someone not taking no for an answer; of someone unrelentingly driven in the pursuit of knowledge, education and self-actualisation; of someone taking and reclaiming power in so many different ways. Susan’s life story is story enough.
I reckon I’ve become a bit numb to horrific stories of startup (and academic) culture, and so I wasn’t all that shocked by Susan’s experience, but the matter-of-fact account, displayed with such clarity, was a joy (if you can say that about problematic stories) to read.
This book was so inspiring, so quick to fly through, and left me pondering many questions about speaking up, power and lifelong learning.
Brilliant.
April 15, 2022
Why, yes, I did watch Super Pumped and was curious about Susan Fowler's book. The audiobook was available from the library, and I'm glad I gave it a listen. Susan narrates herself, and it was a brisk, easy-to-digest 6.5 hour listen. Susan's lead a fascinating life, and I was zero percent surprised to realize she also wrote fiction, and ended up in the pro writing space--she is a natural storyteller. I thought the story arc/thematic arc was brilliantly done--so often when you read these "I was in the center (or adjacent to) of this wild true life thing that happened" memoirs, they can feel a bit by-rote, or pat, or just plain self-involved. Of course this is Susan's life story, but everything she shared about herself and her life is done in the service of the broader arc--and it really is a moving and fascinating story.
So, yeah, if you want to know what tech bro-culture at it's worst is like, why so many women wash out of tech... with a surprising slice of "elite university culture is also hot water trash," I recommend Whistleblower. The audiobook especially is a good listen--like a juicy podcast with just one narrator.
So, yeah, if you want to know what tech bro-culture at it's worst is like, why so many women wash out of tech... with a surprising slice of "elite university culture is also hot water trash," I recommend Whistleblower. The audiobook especially is a good listen--like a juicy podcast with just one narrator.
May 6, 2022
A captivating read! Educated meets Know My Name in Silicon Valley.
February 22, 2020
I almost read it in one gulp but I had to take a break in between because what happened to Susan totally incensed me.
I loved every chapter of it, her upbringing, the dreams, the hunger for knowledge, awful stories of what to her happened (sexual harassment on her first day, Jesus Christ!).
And Susan, you are very very brave. You had to revisit and open the wounds again to write this book. You totally deserve to be commended.
I loved every chapter of it, her upbringing, the dreams, the hunger for knowledge, awful stories of what to her happened (sexual harassment on her first day, Jesus Christ!).
And Susan, you are very very brave. You had to revisit and open the wounds again to write this book. You totally deserve to be commended.
August 29, 2020
I can appreciate her struggle without connecting with the writing.
December 4, 2020
QUICK TAKE: I’ve been a fan of Fowler’s since reading SUPER PUMPED, the behind-the-scenes book about the rise and fall of Uber, last year. Fowler is a big part of the "fall" portion of that story, bringing to light Uber’s culture of sexual harassment and gender discrimination in a scathing blog post that went viral worldwide. Her memoir is insightful and infuriating and digs deeper into her time at Uber and in Silicon Valley and gives you hope for the next generation of tech entrepreneurs. Must read if you liked SHE SAID or KNOW MY NAME.
January 17, 2022
Fowler describes her life experiences that led to her life-defining moment to speak up/speak out about what occurred while she worked at Uber.
February 22, 2020
Rating: 3/5
It's hard to rate this book because I truly believe that what was achieved was very important for society and for the world. That said, rating this purely as a book, it falls a little short. For one, the ending feels quite sudden - this still feels like the middle of Susan Fowler's story and not the end. While the anecdotes about Penn were interesting, they seemed as though they would best align with the Uber story as a series of blogposts, rather than a book.
The audiobook felt a bit impersonal at times, which contrasts with some of the better audiobooks I've read (like those by Anna Kendrick and Tiffany Haddish). There were parts where this was not the case (particularly emotional parts like the death of her father/meeting her husband Chad), but for the most part it felt like someone else reading the autobiography.
I did enjoy the start of the book, describing her struggles with poverty and how stoicism enabled her to single-handedly climb out of it (a to-be recurring theme). The book also details the methodical way Ms. Fowler went about the repeated instances of sexual harrassment, learning from past experiences each time. One anecdote that stuck was about Cmd+Shift+4 -ing a chat out of habit.
Overall, a book I was really looking forward to, but on the whole did not deliver much more than the Uber blog post. That said, its brevity is good (you can always read it and judge for yourself without feeling like days were consumed) and I would still look forward to the next book by the author (if autobiographical, then hopefully after a few years).
It's hard to rate this book because I truly believe that what was achieved was very important for society and for the world. That said, rating this purely as a book, it falls a little short. For one, the ending feels quite sudden - this still feels like the middle of Susan Fowler's story and not the end. While the anecdotes about Penn were interesting, they seemed as though they would best align with the Uber story as a series of blogposts, rather than a book.
The audiobook felt a bit impersonal at times, which contrasts with some of the better audiobooks I've read (like those by Anna Kendrick and Tiffany Haddish). There were parts where this was not the case (particularly emotional parts like the death of her father/meeting her husband Chad), but for the most part it felt like someone else reading the autobiography.
I did enjoy the start of the book, describing her struggles with poverty and how stoicism enabled her to single-handedly climb out of it (a to-be recurring theme). The book also details the methodical way Ms. Fowler went about the repeated instances of sexual harrassment, learning from past experiences each time. One anecdote that stuck was about Cmd+Shift+4 -ing a chat out of habit.
Overall, a book I was really looking forward to, but on the whole did not deliver much more than the Uber blog post. That said, its brevity is good (you can always read it and judge for yourself without feeling like days were consumed) and I would still look forward to the next book by the author (if autobiographical, then hopefully after a few years).
August 15, 2020
I truly hate giving this book so few stars. I really, really hate being so critical of such a brave woman who endured so much at the hands of sexist people both in higher-education and at Uber but, I have to be honest about my opinion.
To start with, the story itself is easy to follow and as someone who did not read her blog, it was enlightening to hear her side of the story. What I disliked about the book is her writing style and how it felt like she had to get across how she's so smart she can learn anything she wants and master it. It felt very egotistical if not a bit unnecessary to the point of the story. She may not have meant to come across this way but it made me feel as if she was trying to say that someone of her intellectual abilities should be immune to things like sexism and sexual harassment.
I understand I could be very wrong about her and that if I knew her personally I would find her authentically humble but I don't know her so I have to rely on her own words and they left me with a negative feeling about her personality.
That all being said, NO ONE deserves the treatment she had to endure. NO ONE should ever have to go through the things Penn State and Uber put her and others through. My opinion about her personality aside, I feel very bad that she went through those things and I'm happy for her present life (being happily married with a daughter and doing what she loves to do professionally). I hope her life continues to bring her joy and I'm glad she was brave enough to come forward.
To start with, the story itself is easy to follow and as someone who did not read her blog, it was enlightening to hear her side of the story. What I disliked about the book is her writing style and how it felt like she had to get across how she's so smart she can learn anything she wants and master it. It felt very egotistical if not a bit unnecessary to the point of the story. She may not have meant to come across this way but it made me feel as if she was trying to say that someone of her intellectual abilities should be immune to things like sexism and sexual harassment.
I understand I could be very wrong about her and that if I knew her personally I would find her authentically humble but I don't know her so I have to rely on her own words and they left me with a negative feeling about her personality.
That all being said, NO ONE deserves the treatment she had to endure. NO ONE should ever have to go through the things Penn State and Uber put her and others through. My opinion about her personality aside, I feel very bad that she went through those things and I'm happy for her present life (being happily married with a daughter and doing what she loves to do professionally). I hope her life continues to bring her joy and I'm glad she was brave enough to come forward.
May 25, 2020
Hell hath no fury....and, from what I read, Uber had no conscience, no compassion, and no humility either. This book is worth reading, if for no other reason than to make you think twice about standing up for your right to be treated fairly, equally, and with respect. That might sound odd, but if you are going to take on the giant you better have a really thick skin, a strong constitution, and a solid base of supporters because the retaliation can be swift, cruel, and relentless.
March 5, 2020
No need to read the book - can look up her original blog post . The only difference is the book has much more of her large ego - tone. Proud of her for standing up but just wish she did it in a more relatable tone to the readers
January 21, 2022
I read this book as a part of a process I choose to be a part of every year to help pick the Common Read book for UM, the book that all freshman UM engineers read before they come to college. For the book selection process I have read memoirs like Educated, sociology books like Evicted, as well as books directly talking about the relationship between engineering and society like Geek Heresy and Life 3.0.
Initially, I thought Whistleblower was a bit of a knock-off Educated--Susan grows up in poverty but has that insatiable hunger to learn about the world, so she pulls herself up by her bootstraps and eventually lands herself at an Ivy League. But from there, we diverge into her damning account of how each institution she ends up at (University of Pennsylvania, PubNub, and most famously Uber) fails to give her anything akin to justice for the harassment, discrimination, and abuse she (and her peers!) experiences.
Reading Susan's experiences fighting against systems that were supposed to bring her justice felt even more poignant to me after reading some essays from We Do This Til We Free Us, which argues that contrary to popular belief that we need these institutions to help victims (especially sexual assault victims--"What about rapists??" the refrain often goes), we often re-traumatize victims through the legal process, where they are often gaslit or simply not believed, most times getting no closure, which is exactly what happens to Susan. She eventually comes to the realization that the people she thinks are there to help /her/, are in reality there to help /the institution/.
I was very excited to see Susan touch on the fact that while Uber was "checking all the boxes" when it came to diversity and inclusion (anti-bias trainings, special positions making sure no discrimination was happening in interviews, getting women into positions of real power, diversity bonuses to managers who had more women/people of color on their teams), it didn't mean anything when women or any person with a marginalized identity could also wield power in an oppressive way (where my girlbosses at!?!), managers could hoard diverse workers by giving them great performance reviews and then switch them to horrible reviews to prevent a transfer to another team, and at the end of the day, a company cares more about its bottom line than treating its workers (drivers or software engineers) with any respect. We need systemic change, and DEI initiatives ain't it (@ UM Engineering).
It wasn't the best book I've ever read but it was a quick read, I'm definitely glad I read it, if only to learn about all the ways a company can and will f*ck you over to keep those at the top happy (hint: keep your receipts and read the fine print). I also didn't actually know Susan's story or all the horrible shit that was happening inside Uber so that was fun to find out about as well.
Initially, I thought Whistleblower was a bit of a knock-off Educated--Susan grows up in poverty but has that insatiable hunger to learn about the world, so she pulls herself up by her bootstraps and eventually lands herself at an Ivy League. But from there, we diverge into her damning account of how each institution she ends up at (University of Pennsylvania, PubNub, and most famously Uber) fails to give her anything akin to justice for the harassment, discrimination, and abuse she (and her peers!) experiences.
Reading Susan's experiences fighting against systems that were supposed to bring her justice felt even more poignant to me after reading some essays from We Do This Til We Free Us, which argues that contrary to popular belief that we need these institutions to help victims (especially sexual assault victims--"What about rapists??" the refrain often goes), we often re-traumatize victims through the legal process, where they are often gaslit or simply not believed, most times getting no closure, which is exactly what happens to Susan. She eventually comes to the realization that the people she thinks are there to help /her/, are in reality there to help /the institution/.
I was very excited to see Susan touch on the fact that while Uber was "checking all the boxes" when it came to diversity and inclusion (anti-bias trainings, special positions making sure no discrimination was happening in interviews, getting women into positions of real power, diversity bonuses to managers who had more women/people of color on their teams), it didn't mean anything when women or any person with a marginalized identity could also wield power in an oppressive way (where my girlbosses at!?!), managers could hoard diverse workers by giving them great performance reviews and then switch them to horrible reviews to prevent a transfer to another team, and at the end of the day, a company cares more about its bottom line than treating its workers (drivers or software engineers) with any respect. We need systemic change, and DEI initiatives ain't it (@ UM Engineering).
It wasn't the best book I've ever read but it was a quick read, I'm definitely glad I read it, if only to learn about all the ways a company can and will f*ck you over to keep those at the top happy (hint: keep your receipts and read the fine print). I also didn't actually know Susan's story or all the horrible shit that was happening inside Uber so that was fun to find out about as well.
February 26, 2020
It got to the point where I wasn’t able to hold back my tears until after meetings anymore. I found myself wiping tears from my face right there in the meetings, hoping that nobody would notice; then I’d go home after work and cry myself to sleep. On days like that, I thought seriously about leaving Uber. I even applied for several other jobs. But, ultimately, I decided to stay. I was twenty-five years old. Uber was the third company I’d worked at since I graduated from Penn only a year and a half earlier. How could I convince the companies I applied to that the problem was with Uber, and not with me? Even worse, what if Kevin and Duncan were right, I’d wonder, and I was really an awful engineer? What if I was so awful that I would never get another job in engineering?
This book is the result of Susan Fowler's efforts after she posted a famous blog post about working at Uber for a year. She was the victim of structural sexual discrimination that flourished in the company, where a culture of sweeping all 'problems'—i.e. sexual-abuse complaints to HR and management—under the rug was the norm.
Fowler is a deft writer who takes the reader on a journey through her younger years, finding her way into both logics and philosophy and later into programming. She was hit with discrimination during her education at the University of Pennsylvania; in the end of that bout, she let it be:
I took the lawyers’ advice and decided to move on with my life. But before I did, I carefully documented everything, saving every email, every call log, every text message. There was part of me that wondered if perhaps I’d change my mind about suing them in the future. And there was another part of me that thought I’d want to write about it someday. My heart broke when I realized that moving on meant giving up on my dream. The professors I’d been counting on for letters of recommendation now refused to talk to me because of the situation with Tim, and without the recommendation letters I needed, I knew I would never be accepted into a physics PhD program. So I trashed my graduate school applications and, with them, my hopes of becoming a physicist.
She made her way to Silicon Valley and spread her wings, first, at a company named Plaid:
Everyone went out for drinks that night to celebrate the two new employees: me and the new office manager, Heidi. We were the only women in the office; as I later learned, they had us start on the same day so that we wouldn’t feel “alone.”
Ooh, the misogyny doesn't seep through: it pours.
Fowler writes well about sexism and other types of work-related abuse becoming normalised. She writes about leaving Plaid for another company, PubNub:
Within a few days, I found out that my boss—who managed me and one other employee—was openly, unabashedly sexist. He commented on my clothing, making fun of me if I ever dressed nicely and telling me I was dumpy if I wore jeans and a T-shirt. He told me that he bet any man I was dating was off secretly having sex with prostitutes. He was also anti-Semitic, frequently commenting about how “stingy” and “Jewish” he thought the founders were (I didn’t dare tell him that I was Jewish, too). The only way I could deal with it was to keep my head down, do my work, and try not to pay attention to anything he said. To keep myself sane, I read the philosophers Epictetus, Seneca, and Marcus Aurelius every morning on my way to work and during my lunch breaks.
Fowler loves—or, at least, loved—stoic philosophers. This paragraph jumped out at me as seeming very strange:
The words of the Stoics reinforced what I already knew: I couldn’t control what others did to me, but I could control how I reacted.
I disagree with not being able to control what others do; this book is proof that one's actions lead to how others treat you. Also, it's not always possible to control one's own reactions, e.g. if raped. These are important distinctions.
Before signing on with Uber, Fowler searched the web to see whether she could find any wrongdoings at the company; she found nothing:
What I didn’t know at the time was that the mere fact that there was no public record of wrongdoing wasn’t because Uber had a spotless record, but because all Uber employees were bound by forced arbitration. Forced arbitration clauses are often included in employment agreements that workers must sign as a condition of employment, usually on their very first day of work—not only at tech companies like Uber, but at many companies in the United States.
Nefarious, to say the least.
One early warning sign at Uber was this:
Uber encouraged employees to spend time working with their coworkers over the holidays rather than with their families and offered employees free all-inclusive trips almost anywhere in the world if they chose work over family.
Her manager swiftly started writing about his open relationship with his girlfriend and went into sex immediately and often. When Fowler turned to HR to rectify the situation, they reacted:
Then she gave me a “choice”: I could stay on the cloud team, with Jake as my manager—though I would likely receive a bad performance review from him because I had turned down his advances and reported him to HR—or I could transfer to a different SRE team.
This book should be read by men, especially men in manager or executive roles, to not only make them understand how non-men are being treated by men, but also make them aware of their fallacies: if something is brought to HR, it must be treated with the urgency it deserves. Everybody deserves to be treated equally and nicely at work.
Fowler bravely fought Uber, their HR people, went to executives, spoke with friends and family, and went further than a lot of people would dare or have the strength to do, while battling an earthquake of issues that were designed to make her quit working at Uber.
Still, she persisted, and the rest is history: one person can make a difference (even though more persons than herself were involved in toppling Uber's sexist structure, which may still be in place for all I know).
There are lovely segues throughout the book that point to a promising future for non-male tech workers (including men):
Rigetti Quantum Computing and Uber Technologies were at opposite ends of the spectrum: Chad wanted Rigetti Quantum Computing to be a company filled with joy, where people came into work excited and passionate about the technical challenges of building quantum computers and working as a team to solve hard problems; Uber, on the other hand, was a company driven by aggression, hell-bent on destroying the competition no matter the cost, where it felt like people came into work to tear down, not to build up.
To quote Beastie Boys: 'be true to yourself and you will never fall'.
Susan Fowler was brave enough to stand up against a tech giant and they fell.
This book is both a lovely example of how critique and whistleblowing must be included in a worker's guide and how great workplaces can be built.
November 13, 2023
Whistleblower is a memoir of the Susan Fowler's life leading up to her blog post that set a chain reaction around the world. First with the fall of Uber and Travis Kalanick - the amazingly toxic work culture that he fostered in his company and then with the rise of the #meToo movement that helped victims of sexual harassment come forward and document their experience without fear of retribution.
The first part of the book covers Susan's life growing up in a small community in rural Arizona. It was a difficult childhood in poverty with the family struggling to make ends meet. Education was an escape from this life. But it was hard on Susan and she faced discrimination again at University of Pennsylvania. The story of her childhood has shades of the similar experiences to Tara Westover "Educated".
The second part of the book covers her professional life and the crazy experience she had at companies like Plaid, Pubnub and eventually Uber in which she tried to navigate the white-male dominated hard driving aggressive culture at Uber helmed by since-disgraced-CEO Travis Kalanick. The details of the experiences were painful to read and it must have been very difficult for her to pen them down with all of the media attention.
Overall, very well written account of her life leading upto the Uber experience. I had read some part of the excerpts on various websites online but the book provided additional context into Uber and toxic silicon valley culture.
The first part of the book covers Susan's life growing up in a small community in rural Arizona. It was a difficult childhood in poverty with the family struggling to make ends meet. Education was an escape from this life. But it was hard on Susan and she faced discrimination again at University of Pennsylvania. The story of her childhood has shades of the similar experiences to Tara Westover "Educated".
The second part of the book covers her professional life and the crazy experience she had at companies like Plaid, Pubnub and eventually Uber in which she tried to navigate the white-male dominated hard driving aggressive culture at Uber helmed by since-disgraced-CEO Travis Kalanick. The details of the experiences were painful to read and it must have been very difficult for her to pen them down with all of the media attention.
Overall, very well written account of her life leading upto the Uber experience. I had read some part of the excerpts on various websites online but the book provided additional context into Uber and toxic silicon valley culture.
February 20, 2020
This is a straight-to-the-point account of the excruciating details she went through at Uber and how she survived the aftermath. It's shorter than I expected, but the suspense of being under covert and over surveillance carries the pace fully. My minor criticism is, the book builds up with her story as tech/science woman, until 3/4 in, when she gives it all up because, well actually, "her dream was to be a writer". Oh.
The bits where the current Uber CEO essentially admits Travis Kalanick had a program of following, threatening and surveilling employees and opponents is fodder for a potential RICO investigation IMO.
The insistence of "doing the right thing" carries through the book and makes it a poignant tale for our times where courage is lacking at every corner.
One minor criticism is how, in the book, she describes how she made the jump from studying physics to engineering and then suddenly, almost out of nowhere, leaves her engineering career by jumping into writing/editing (at Stripe) PRIOR to the blog post about Uber. I can understand how she may have needed a break from the cesspool of hate and abuse she encountered daily at Uber, but it felt unresolved to me, as in I didn't understand the jump.
This is disappointing to me because as the book progresses I was rooting for her ALSO because of her passion for tech and science. Once she reveals that "actually I really wanted to be a writer" it feels like a let down. I wonder about other women who didn't give up when they encountered harassment.
It was also disappointing to read how she was dismissive of engineering as a career path, she talks a lot about how she loved physics and how to her, that was sort of a step down from physics. The revelation about the role tech played in her life - that it was secondary, made me like her a little less; I idealized her before. I wanted her to be my tech hero but that is not, at the end of the day, something she cares as much about I don't think.
This might be a function of her age, where she frames all career moves as "it was always my dream to ___ ", but I wish she had been a bit more honest or prodding about it. "I felt like I didn't have a future in tech" or "I hated that environment of constant abuse" would have felt more honest or coherent, than "actually I had also always dreamt of being a writer".
If feels unclear to me, just because up to that point in her book, she had framed her path as that of a technical person and scientist. I didn't quite understand how she jumped suddenly and somehow at that point it came out of the woodwork that she had always dreamt of being a writer (?!!).
One of the issues her book raises is how hard it is for women to pursue careers in science and technology. YET in the end she didn't actually pursue a career in science and tech, she worked in tech for a few years, then became a writer and editor. Which proves the point of harassment of course - you'd do ANYTHING to escape abuse - but at the same time it makes me wish she had stayed in the tech/science world.
The bits where the current Uber CEO essentially admits Travis Kalanick had a program of following, threatening and surveilling employees and opponents is fodder for a potential RICO investigation IMO.
The insistence of "doing the right thing" carries through the book and makes it a poignant tale for our times where courage is lacking at every corner.
One minor criticism is how, in the book, she describes how she made the jump from studying physics to engineering and then suddenly, almost out of nowhere, leaves her engineering career by jumping into writing/editing (at Stripe) PRIOR to the blog post about Uber. I can understand how she may have needed a break from the cesspool of hate and abuse she encountered daily at Uber, but it felt unresolved to me, as in I didn't understand the jump.
This is disappointing to me because as the book progresses I was rooting for her ALSO because of her passion for tech and science. Once she reveals that "actually I really wanted to be a writer" it feels like a let down. I wonder about other women who didn't give up when they encountered harassment.
It was also disappointing to read how she was dismissive of engineering as a career path, she talks a lot about how she loved physics and how to her, that was sort of a step down from physics. The revelation about the role tech played in her life - that it was secondary, made me like her a little less; I idealized her before. I wanted her to be my tech hero but that is not, at the end of the day, something she cares as much about I don't think.
This might be a function of her age, where she frames all career moves as "it was always my dream to ___ ", but I wish she had been a bit more honest or prodding about it. "I felt like I didn't have a future in tech" or "I hated that environment of constant abuse" would have felt more honest or coherent, than "actually I had also always dreamt of being a writer".
If feels unclear to me, just because up to that point in her book, she had framed her path as that of a technical person and scientist. I didn't quite understand how she jumped suddenly and somehow at that point it came out of the woodwork that she had always dreamt of being a writer (?!!).
One of the issues her book raises is how hard it is for women to pursue careers in science and technology. YET in the end she didn't actually pursue a career in science and tech, she worked in tech for a few years, then became a writer and editor. Which proves the point of harassment of course - you'd do ANYTHING to escape abuse - but at the same time it makes me wish she had stayed in the tech/science world.
February 21, 2020
What an incredibly difficult read. Fowler is honest and clear eyed about her life before Uber and provides all the details behind the infamous blog post that opened up the floodgates for stories about sexual harassment in Silicon Valley and led to the ouster of Uber’s CEO. It’s difficult because the gaslighting that Fowler faced every step of the way was so pervasive that it made me want to scream. Hats off to Susan and all those like her who have fought for the right simply to do their jobs without being harassed.
February 4, 2021
I sat down and read this book in two sittings, after having left it on my shelf for over a year. Similar to "Know My Name," I avoided this book for a while, afraid that certain elements of the story would be too painful to read or hit a little too close to home. Susan Fowler's story beyond her time at Uber is incredible, and shows how her persistence and commitment to learning have helped her overcome a lack of access to formal education and various other roadblocks that were placed in her path. There are a lot of parts to her story outside of Uber that I didn't know about, such as the harassment she endured at Penn and mishandling by the Penn administration.
March 13, 2020
4.25/5 stars
Whistleblower is a memoir following Susan Fowler throughout childhood until after her difficult experiences with Uber.
Susan is such an inspiration, her passion towards education and her drive to get one was incredible. The hardships she faced before entering the workforce truly built her into a person capable of facing and exposing the toxic and abusive work environment at Uber. Memoirs from whistleblowers might be my new favourite thing, I mean why wouldn't I want to read about an inspiring person who strives to do what is right and is firm in their morals?
Whistleblower is a memoir following Susan Fowler throughout childhood until after her difficult experiences with Uber.
Susan is such an inspiration, her passion towards education and her drive to get one was incredible. The hardships she faced before entering the workforce truly built her into a person capable of facing and exposing the toxic and abusive work environment at Uber. Memoirs from whistleblowers might be my new favourite thing, I mean why wouldn't I want to read about an inspiring person who strives to do what is right and is firm in their morals?
May 29, 2020
I'm hesitant to read Silicon Valley books, because I live and work in San Francisco.
But! I also worked with Susan back in the day on some of her technical talks. I appreciated how kind, positive, and easy she was to work with, and was always impressed and inspired by her talent.
I sort of assumed, like everyone else at the company we were both at seemed to be, that she was "born that way." Born a genius, someone that everything came to naturally. Reading this book taught me I was SO OFF, and made me admire Susan even more. She's of course obviously exceptionally talented and curious, but she also talks openly about how she got there, struggling to grok her early college-level physics classes without any real education beforehand, but that she kept at it because she loved it. I need more role models like this, ones who keep going because they love something, who don't let not being the best at something deter them from learning and contributing what they can.
I also appreciated learning how she pivoted after every obstacle. Solid lessons, all around!
But! I also worked with Susan back in the day on some of her technical talks. I appreciated how kind, positive, and easy she was to work with, and was always impressed and inspired by her talent.
I sort of assumed, like everyone else at the company we were both at seemed to be, that she was "born that way." Born a genius, someone that everything came to naturally. Reading this book taught me I was SO OFF, and made me admire Susan even more. She's of course obviously exceptionally talented and curious, but she also talks openly about how she got there, struggling to grok her early college-level physics classes without any real education beforehand, but that she kept at it because she loved it. I need more role models like this, ones who keep going because they love something, who don't let not being the best at something deter them from learning and contributing what they can.
I also appreciated learning how she pivoted after every obstacle. Solid lessons, all around!
March 4, 2020
Interesting story. Do yourself a favour and pass on the audiobook.
April 13, 2020
If you're interested in her experience with Uber alone, you need only to read the blog post. What makes up the volume of the book is a succession of adjacent experiences where the author found herself in a conflict, brought it to the appropriate people, and was ultimately told to put aside her concerns for the advancement/well being of men. Her time with Uber was ultimately the straw that broke the camel's back, and it's an important story. As a book, I rate it on the lower side due to writing style. Fowler isn't a particularly illustrative author, it reads very "this happened. Then this happened." And while I believe her account, a skeptical reader is going to feel there are holes in the story. It's written in such a black and white, ultimately unjust way without much corroborating detail, and I wished to be a fly on the wall and experience these meetings with HR myself, not to sympathize with Uber, but to be truly outraged, to see the insidious cahoots in motion.
April 11, 2020
At first, I was a little put off by the extensive details of her childhood and experiences at college- I mean, this was supposed to be a book about the culture at Uber, right? But starting with her career at Uber, or even in Silicon Valley, wouldn't have explained her quick reflexes to document and report everything that happened to her along the way and it also would have made it seem like she complained at the first little thing that had ever happened to her. While I've read worse accounts of things that have happened to women, this was by far one of the most clear and well-documented cases. I think this book is important for women (or any minority) to read to understand that this kind of behavior can still exist in large companies and can even be exacerbated by women within those companies- as illustrated by the women in Uber's HR department (now that's a POV I'd like to read). But hopefully, the more people that speak out, the more these companies will be forced to change and grow away from the tech bro culture and into something more inclusive.
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July 21, 2020Second book for the reading rush complete!
I don't feel comfortable giving memoirs etc star ratings most of the time, so I won't.
Such an important read. Enlightening, depressing, inspiring.
I don't feel comfortable giving memoirs etc star ratings most of the time, so I won't.
Such an important read. Enlightening, depressing, inspiring.
December 22, 2021
Love this book and her life story- everyone needs to read this book to see what women go through in the workforce. Such an inspiring woman.
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