AARHUS UNIVERSITY

Bachelor økonomi 1. del/BSc in Business Administration Part 1

Winter exam 2023-24

Ordinary exam

Written assignment 460141E007 - Organisational behaviour

Duration: 6 hours, 09:00 – 15:00

Supplementary material allowed at the examination: Open book test, WOA exam

Uber
The below information about Uber comes from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uber (retrieved
30/11, 2023, references not included):

“Uber provides ride-hailing services, food delivery, and freight transport. It is headquartered
in San Francisco and operates in approximately 70 countries and 10,500 cities worldwide.
The company has over 131 million monthly active users and 6 million active drivers and
couriers worldwide and facilitates an average of 25 million trips per day. It has facilitated 42
billion trips since its inception in 2010 and is the largest ridesharing company in the United
States.”

Travis Kalanick was CEO of Uber from 2010 to 2017. He resigned from Uber in 2017, after
growing pressure resulting from public reports of the company's unethical corporate culture.

The appendixes concern the time in Uber where Travis Kalanick was CEO, and they illustrate
what led to his resignation.

Based on the course curriculum, introduction text and appendixes, please

answer the following questions (all questions carry equal weight):

Your exam paper must not exceed 24,000 characters incl. spaces. Figures, tables,
illustrations etc. imbedded as pictures count as 800 characters each – regardless of
their size.

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1. Appendixes 1 and 2 concern the drivers who drive for Uber. In appendix 1 it is described
how it was to work for Uber in the beginning, and how it has developed. Based on the
curriculum related to motivation, please identify 2 theoretical contributions, which – in a
theoretically based analysis – can illustrate why the drivers express being motivated in
their work for Uber in the beginning, and why this has changed? You must substantiate
and elaborate your answer.
2. Based on the curriculum related to leadership, please identify 2 theoretical contributions,
which can characterise Travis Kalanick as leader. You are to prepare the analysis in
relation to each contribution, and as an important element in your analysis, it must contain
a theoretically based discussion of whether Travis Kalanick is a good leader.
3. Based on a characteristic of the organisational culture, please prepare a theoretically
based analysis of how the culture is perpetuated under Travis Kalanick. You must
substantiate and exemplify your answer based on the case. As a minimum you must use
two different theoretical contributions in your answer to the question.
4. In appendix 6 the following problem is pointed out: “Highly talented, entrepreneurial
people can quickly find themselves at the helm of a multinational organisation with more
employees than they could have possibly planned for.” Based on the curriculum related to
the theme about Organizational structure and design, please give a theoretically based
explanation of why this has become a problem in Uber. Please substantiate and elaborate
your answer.

Appendix overview:

1) As Uber expanded globally, many drivers felt left behind

2) Uber admits underpaying New York City drivers by millions of dollars
3) Inside Uber’s Aggressive, Unrestrained Workplace Culture
4) Uber's 'hustle-oriented' culture becomes a black mark on employees' résumés
5) Uber Founder Travis Kalanick Resigns as C.E.O.
6) Uber: A leadership failure that consumed a whole business
7) Uber's Travis Kalanick Shows Leaders the Price of Obsession

Please pay attention to the following:

• As stated in the course description, the assignment is individual.

• Your exam paper is only to be based on the introduction text and appendixes 1-7.
• You are allowed to make realistic assumptions whenever necessary and/or appropriate.

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Appendix 1: As Uber expanded globally, many drivers felt left behind

By Brenda Medina, July 19, 2022.

Source: https://www.icij.org/investigations/uber-files/as-uber-expanded-globally-many-
drivers-felt-left-behind/, retrieved November, 2023. The below is an extract.

The ride-hailing app lured its earliest workers with hefty incentives. But as early promises
faded, these drivers describe how their earnings dropped and dangers mounted.

In the early days of Uber’s expansion, the company spent millions of dollars to attract drivers
to its platform. To keep them coming, Uber paid drivers bonuses, stoking the hopes of low-
income workers in many countries while undermining taxi monopolies.

But the incentives didn’t last. As the Uber Files detail, after the company had lured enough
drivers, and claimed a big enough slice of a local market, it slashed those benefits.

As pay decreased, some Uber drivers also found themselves accepting rides in dangerous
areas that they once would have avoided, threatening their safety, they said.

In interviews with ICIJ and partners, current and former drivers described work that has
become both more demanding and less lucrative, forcing them to work longer hours for the
same pay — and for some, to take risks they wouldn’t otherwise take.

Jill Hazelbaker, Uber’s head of public affairs, said the company has worked hard over the
past few years to improve its relationship with drivers, and is listening to driver feedback and
implementing new measures to keep them safe. “Drivers have been and always will be an
extremely important part of Uber,” she said. “It’s equally true that we haven’t always treated
that relationship with the care and respect it deserves.”

Here is one driver’s accounts of life on the road with Uber.

Abdurzak Hadi

Location: London, England

Years working for Uber: 2014-present

A Somalia-born former minicab driver, Abdurzak Hadi began working for Uber in 2014. “I
thought it was going to revolutionize the industry and for the first time, I was being paid not
just for the distance of a ride but for the time it took as well,” he told ICIJ’s partner The
Guardian. He also liked that he could work around hospital appointments of one of his four
children who had been diagnosed with leukemia, he said.

The experience, initially, was good: fares were plentiful and he received bonuses. “It was
honey at that point,” he said.

But he said Uber soon cut out those bonuses and increased the commission it collected on
rides. Hadi’s take-home dropped significantly, he said. In 2015, he earned so little in a 50-

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hour work week that his family qualified for welfare, he said. That year he and other U.K.
drivers sued Uber, seeking to force the company to recognize them as workers with
employment rights, including minimum wage and holiday pay. Uber ultimately lost the case.

Hadi said he continues working full-time for Uber, earning about $23,000 last year.
Hazelbaker, Uber’s spokesperson, said the company complied with the court order and that
driver earnings in the U.K. “are at or near all-time high.”

But Hadi and other drivers are still fighting on the question of what counts as paid work time.
Hadi’s records for the first quarter of 2022 show that about 35% of his time logged on to the
app was spent waiting for a fare. Uber doesn’t pay drivers for this time — the company says
drivers are free to use it to drive for other ride-hailing apps.

Hadi said he only drives for Uber. “I love driving and meeting and talking to lots of people,”
he said. Hadi also feels he doesn’t have other good options, because the company controls
most of the London market, he said. “There’s not enough work left elsewhere.”

Appendix 2: Uber admits underpaying New York City drivers by millions of dollars

By Julia Carrie Wong in San Francisco, Tue 23 May 2017 21.59 CEST

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/may/23/uber-underpaid-drivers-new-
york-city, retrieved November, 2023. The below is an extract.

Under the terms of service the ride-hailing company put in place in November 2014, Uber
was supposed to take its percentage of the commission – ranging between 20% and 25% –
after deducting sales tax and a local fee to fund benefits for injured drivers. Instead, the
company calculated its commission on the gross fare, resulting in more money for Uber and
less for drivers.

With tens of thousands of drivers eligible for a refund, the company will be on the hook for
tens of millions of dollars. An Uber spokesperson said that the company discovered the
mistake in recent weeks, as it was preparing to roll out a new pricing scheme.

However, questions about Uber’s calculation of New York City commissions were raised
nearly a year ago in a class-action lawsuit filed by the New York Taxi Workers Alliance
(NYTWA). The suit, which was filed in federal court in New York in June 2016, alleged that
Uber’s deduction of sales tax and the injured driver fee after the commission was calculated
violated the terms of service and amounted to wage “theft”, as Bloomberg BNA reported at
the time.

This is the second time in recent months that Uber has admitted to underpaying US drivers.
In March, the company paid refunds to UberBlack drivers in Philadelphia after charging them
an extra 5% in commission for about 18 months. In January, Uber agreed to pay $20m to

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settle allegations by the Federal Trade Commission that it had tricked drivers with false
promises of higher earnings.

Uber has been accused of shortchanging drivers in numerous lawsuits, including a recent suit
that alleges Uber’s “upfront” pricing scheme is designed to “defraud drivers”.

“We are committed to paying every driver every penny they are owed – plus interest – as
quickly as possible,” Rachel Holt, Uber’s regional general manager for the US and Canada,
said in a statement. “We are working hard to regain driver trust, and that means being
transparent, sticking to our word, and making the Uber experience better from end to end.”

Bhairavi Desai, the executive director of the NYTWA, said that while she welcomed Uber’s
“progress”, her organization believes that it is unlawful for Uber to take the sales tax and fee
from the driver’s fare in the first place.

“Uber hasn’t just wrongly calculated its commission, it has been unlawfully taking the cost of
sales tax and an injured worker surcharge right out of driver pay as opposed to charging it on
top of the fare as the law requires,” Desai said in a statement.

“This payout is an attempt by Uber to pull a fast one to avoid court oversight and shortchange
drivers in the process,” she added. “Nice try. We’ll see you in court to win back all of the
money drivers are owed, includ[ing] up to double damages.”

Uber has long faced criticism over its treatment of drivers, which it considers independent
contractors rather than employees. The classification of drivers as contractors allows Uber to
avoid paying minimum wage or providing benefits such as workers’ compensation.

In March, a video of Travis Kalanick berating an Uber driver went viral, prompting the CEO
to apologize and seek “leadership help”. In the video, Kalanick responded to his Uber driver
raising concerns about his livelihood by saying: “Some people don’t like to take
responsibility for their own shit. They blame everything in their life on somebody else.”

The embattled CEO has faced a slew of scandals this year, including allegations of
widespread sexual harassment and gender discrimination and a costly intellectual property
battle with Alphabet. In March, the New York Times reported that about 500,000 riders have
deleted their accounts in protest of the company’s practices.

Appendix 3: Inside Uber’s Aggressive, Unrestrained Workplace Culture

By Mike Isaac, Feb. 22, 2017

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/22/technology/uber-workplace-culture.html,
retrieved November, 2023. The below is an extract.

SAN FRANCISCO — When new employees join Uber, they are asked to subscribe to 14
core company values, including making bold bets, being “obsessed” with the customer, and

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“always be hustlin’.” The ride-hailing service particularly emphasizes “meritocracy,” the idea
that the best and brightest will rise to the top based on their efforts, even if it means stepping
on toes to get there. Those values have helped propel Uber to one of Silicon Valley’s biggest
success stories. The company is valued at close to $70 billion by private investors and now
operates in more than 70 countries.

Yet the focus on pushing for the best result has also fueled what current and former Uber
employees describe as a Hobbesian environment at the company, in which workers are
sometimes pitted against one another and where a blind eye is turned to infractions from top
performers.

Interviews with more than 30 current and former Uber employees, as well as reviews of
internal emails, chat logs and tape-recorded meetings, paint a picture of an often unrestrained
workplace culture. Among the most egregious accusations from employees, who either
witnessed or were subject to incidents and who asked to remain anonymous because of
confidentiality agreements and fear of retaliation: A director shouted a homophobic slur at a
subordinate during a heated confrontation in a meeting. Another manager threatened to beat
an underperforming employee’s head in with a baseball bat.

Until this week, this culture was only whispered about in Silicon Valley. Then on Sunday,
Susan Fowler, an engineer who left Uber in December, published a blog post about her time
at the company. She detailed a history of discrimination and sexual harassment by her
managers, which she said was shrugged off by Uber’s human resources department. Ms.
Fowler said the culture was stoked — and even fostered — by those at the top of the
company.

“It seemed like every manager was fighting their peers and attempting to undermine their
direct supervisor so that they could have their direct supervisor’s job,” Ms. Fowler wrote.
“No attempts were made by these managers to hide what they were doing: They boasted
about it in meetings, told their direct reports about it, and the like.”

Her revelations have spurred hand-wringing over how unfriendly Silicon Valley workplaces
can be to women and provoked an internal crisis at Uber. The company’s chief executive,
Travis Kalanick, has opened an internal investigation into the accusations and has brought in
the board member Arianna Huffington and the former attorney general Eric H. Holder Jr. to
look into harassment issues and the human resources department.

To contain the fallout, Mr. Kalanick also began more disclosure. On Monday, he said that
15.1 percent of Uber’s engineering, product management and scientist roles were filled by
women, and that those numbers had not changed substantively over the past year.

Mr. Kalanick also held a 90-minute all-hands meeting on Tuesday, during which he and other
executives were besieged with dozens of questions and pleas from employees who were
aghast at — or strongly identified with — Ms. Fowler’s story and demanded change.

In what was described by five attendees as an emotional moment, and according to a video of
the meeting reviewed by The New York Times, Mr. Kalanick apologized to employees for
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leading the company and the culture to this point. “What I can promise you is that I will get
better every day,” he said. “I can tell you that I am authentically and fully dedicated to getting
to the bottom of this.”

As chief executive, Mr. Kalanick has long set the tone for Uber. Under him, Uber has taken a
pugnacious approach to business, flouting local laws and criticizing competitors in a race to
expand as quickly as possible.

That tone has been echoed in Uber’s workplace. At least two former Uber workers said they
had notified Thuan Pham, the company’s chief technical officer, of workplace harassment at
the hands of managers and colleagues in 2016. One also emailed Mr. Kalanick.

Uber’s aggressive culture began with its 2009 founding, when Mr. Kalanick and another
founder, Garrett Camp, created a start-up that would let customers hail a cab with little more
than a few taps of their smartphone — bypassing many of the headaches people had with the
taxi industry.

To grow quickly, Uber kept its structure decentralized, emphasizing autonomy among
regional offices. General managers are encouraged to “be themselves,” another of Uber’s
core values, and are empowered to make decisions without intense supervision from the
company’s San Francisco headquarters. The top priority: Achieve growth and revenue
targets.

While Uber is now the dominant ride-hailing company in the United States, and is rapidly
growing in South America, India and other countries, its explosive growth has come at a cost
internally. As Uber hired more employees, its internal politics became more convoluted.
Getting ahead, employees said, often involved undermining departmental leaders or
colleagues.

Workers like Ms. Fowler who went to human resources with their problems said they were
often left stranded. She and a half-dozen others said human resources often made excuses for
top performers because of their ability to improve the health of the business. Occasionally,
problematic managers who were the subject of numerous complaints were shuffled around
different regions; firings were less common.

One group appeared immune to internal scrutiny, the current and former employees said.
Members of the group, called the A-Team and composed of executives who were personally
close to Mr. Kalanick, were shielded from much accountability over their actions.

One member of the A-Team was Emil Michael, senior vice president for business, who was
caught up in a public scandal over comments he made in 2014 about digging into the private
lives of journalists who opposed the company. Mr. Kalanick defended Mr. Michael, saying
he believed Mr. Michael could learn from his mistakes.

Since Ms. Fowler’s blog post, several Uber employees have said they are considering leaving
the company. Some are waiting until their equity compensation from Uber, which is
restricted stock units, is vested. Others said they had started sending résumés to competitors.

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Still other employees said they were hopeful that Uber could change. Mr. Kalanick has
promised to deliver a diversity report to better detail the number of women and minorities
who work at Uber, and the company is holding listening sessions with employees.

At the Tuesday all-hands meeting, Ms. Huffington, the Uber board member, also vowed that
the company would make another change. According to attendees and video of the meeting,
Ms. Huffington said there would no longer be hiring of “brilliant jerks.”

Appendix 4: Uber's 'hustle-oriented' culture becomes a black mark on employees'

résumés

By Julia Carrie Wong in San Francisco, Tue 7 Mar 2017 11.00 CET

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/mar/07/uber-work-culture-travis-
kalanick-susan-fowler-controversy, retrieved November, 2023. The below is an extract.

The brazen attitude that helped Uber soar is backfiring, and now employees looking for their
next jobs are having to defend themselves to recruiters. David was attending “Uberversity”,
the ride-hail company’s three-day orientation for new employees, when he was introduced to
“the Uber way”.

The trainers gave David, who asked not to be identified by his real name, and his cohort a
scenario: Uber has learned that a rival company is launching an equivalent to UberPool (the
company’s carpooling service) in four weeks. It’s impossible for Uber to beat them to market
with a functional and reliable carpool service. Then the group was asked: what should the
company do?

“The correct answer (and what they did) was: develop an incomplete solution and beat the
competitor to market,” David said. This was in keeping with one of the company’s 14 core
values: “Always be hustlin’”. Those who proposed taking more time to come up with a
product rather than rushing to beat the competition to market were told: “That’s not the Uber
way.”

The Uber way – a take-no-prisoners, win-at-any-cost mentality – has helped the company
soar to market domination and a $70bn valuation, but not without a cost. Uber’s corporate
culture has been blamed for a series of public relations disasters that have tainted its brand
with customers, investors and regulators.

Now the fallout from Uber’s terrible month is having an impact on another group: the
company’s own former and current employees.

“People are looking to get out because they’re just sick of working for that company,” said a
former Uber employee, who asked not to be identified. “A lot of them have told me that
they’re having a hard time finding something new.”

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At job interviews, the employee said, recruiters seem wary of Uber’s “hustle-oriented”
workplace. “They have to defend themselves and say: ‘Oh, I’m not an asshole.’” The
“asshole” reputation stems from Uber’s corporate values, former employees and others in the
tech industry said. For many, company “values” are the kind of corporate speak that rarely
interferes with one’s day-to-day work environment. But at Uber, the emphasis on hustling,
toe-stepping and meritocracy took on a more sinister aspect in the workplace. “Everyone used
those values to excuse their bad behavior,” said the former Uber employee. The employee
described the workplace as a “Hobbesian jungle” where “you can never get ahead unless
someone else dies”.

Keala Lusk, a former Uber software engineer, wrote on Medium that during her time at Uber
she saw “malicious fights for power, interns repeatedly putting in over 100 hours a week but
only getting paid for 40, discrimination against women, and prejudice against the transgender
community”.

Miley got a taste of Uber’s culture when he interviewed there for a director of engineering
role. “When I questioned pointedly about their culture and my concerns, they doubled down
on it,” he said, telling him, “We do have an aggressive culture, we do step on people’s toes,
and we think that the best way to get performance out of people.” Miley withdrew his
application before the final interview. “If you’re telling me that you’re going to justify being
an asshole because it helps people perform, I don’t want to work there,” he said.

Jonathan Bernstein, the president of Bernstein Crisis Management, said that Uber needs a
total “paradigm shift” soon or they will end up on the wrong side of Silicon Valley’s own
Hobbesian jungle.

Appendix 5: Uber Founder Travis Kalanick Resigns as C.E.O.

By Mike Isaac, June 21, 2017

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/21/technology/uber-ceo-travis-kalanick.html,
retrieved November, 2023. The below is an extract.

Travis Kalanick stepped down Tuesday as chief executive of Uber, the ride-hailing service
that he helped found in 2009 and built into a transportation colossus, after a shareholder
revolt made it untenable for him to stay on at the company.

In the letter, titled “Moving Uber Forward” and obtained by The New York Times, the
investors wrote to Mr. Kalanick that he must immediately leave and that the company needed
a change in leadership. Mr. Kalanick, 40, consulted with at least one Uber board member, and
after long discussions with some of the investors, he agreed to step down.

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“I love Uber more than anything in the world and at this difficult moment in my personal life
I have accepted the investors request to step aside so that Uber can go back to building rather
than be distracted with another fight,” Mr. Kalanick said in a statement.

Uber’s board said in a statement that Mr. Kalanick had “always put Uber first” and that his
stepping down as chief executive would give the company “room to fully embrace this new
chapter in Uber’s history.” An Uber spokesman declined to comment further.

The move caps months of questions over the leadership of Uber, which has become a prime
example of Silicon Valley start-up culture gone awry. The company has been exposed this
year as having a workplace culture that included sexual harassment and discrimination, and it
has pushed the envelope in dealing with law enforcement and even partners. That tone was
set by Mr. Kalanick, who has aggressively turned the company into the world’s dominant
ride-hailing service and upended the transportation industry around the globe.

Uber has been trying to move past its difficult history, which has grown inextricably tied to
Mr. Kalanick. In recent months, Uber has fired more than 20 employees after an investigation
into the company’s culture, embarked on major changes to professionalize its workplace, and
is searching for new executives including a chief operating officer.

Mr. Kalanick last week said he would take an indefinite leave of absence from Uber. He said
Uber’s day-to-day management would fall to a committee of more than 10 executives.

But the shareholder letter indicated that his taking time off was not enough for some investors
who have pumped millions of dollars into the ride-hailing company, which has seen its
valuation swell to nearly $70 billion. For them, Mr. Kalanick had to go.

Taking a start-up chief executive to task so publicly is relatively unusual in Silicon Valley,
where investors often praise entrepreneurs and their aggressiveness, especially if their
companies are growing fast. It is only when those start-ups are in a precarious position or are
declining that shareholders move to protect their investment.

In the case of Uber — one of the most highly valued private companies in the world —
investors could lose billions of dollars if the company were to be marked down in valuation.

Mr. Kalanick is stepping down as Uber works to improve its relationships with some of its
constituencies. Earlier Tuesday, the company emailed its drivers, who work as contractors, to
let them know they would soon be allowed to take tips, which drivers had not been able to
accept previously. The tipping change was among several new initiatives announced for
drivers. “Over the next 180 days we are committed to making driving with Uber better than
ever,” the company said. “We know there’s a long road ahead, but we won’t stop until we get
there.”

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Appendix 6: Uber: A leadership failure that consumed a whole business

By Shereen Ali, Deputy Editor, June 22, 2017

Source: https://the-cfo.io/2017/06/22/uber-a-leadership-failure-that-consumed-a-whole-
business/, retrieved November, 2023. The below is an extract.

After the resignation of Uber's CEO, Travis Kalanick, after allegations of misogyny and a
lack of accountability by a former employee, an expert looks at how a toxic leadership can
consume a whole business, and how to avoid it.

In the wake of the resignation of Uber’s high-profile CEO, John Williams, Director of Digital
Strategy at ILM looks at how a toxic work culture can consume a whole business.

CEO Travis Kalanick’s resignation is the culmination of a three-month independent

investigation, commissioned after a damning blog post from a former employee, that exposes
a work culture described as toxic, misogynistic, and with a widespread lack of accountability.

With people apparently complicit at all levels, and indeed across countries, of the
organisation, it is clear just how pervasive this problematic culture at Uber is.

How did this happen?

In today’s organisations, the tone and culture are still set from the very top. Any CEO, MD or
FD has a huge impact on how the wider team operates and behaves. By his own admission as
well as from an outsider’s perspective, Kalanick set the tone for Uber – and this has,
ultimately, cost him his position.

So why Uber?

Uber is a classic case of the problems that come with lightning quick growth.

Establishing cultures is complex for fast-growing and disruptive businesses like start-ups.
Highly talented, entrepreneurial people can quickly find themselves at the helm of a
multinational organisation with more employees than they could have possibly planned for.

Whether founder, owner or board level leader, they will be more used to the familiarity that
comes with working in small, intimate organisations, and may embody an aggressive
approach to growing and building their business.

Whilst technically proficient, their expertise may stop short of ‘softer’ skills – teamwork,
communication, decision-making. The reality is that without the most fundamental of
leadership skills they will be ill-equipped to achieve the most crucial of their responsibilities:
motivating and inspiring those around them. And without dedicating the time or resource to
cultivating an effective workplace structure that works for everyone, problematic gaps open
up.

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Why wasn’t it stopped?

With such an experienced board in place at Uber, how was this behaviour allowed to get as
far as it did?

Negative behaviours can seep into organisations unnoticed. Once established, it can be very
hard to pinpoint and remove them until something goes wrong. Until then, a catalogue of
incidents might occur without the realisation of their common theme: namely, a
malfunctioning culture.

When recruiting, employers look for chemistry. This can mean employing executives in their
shadow, or steering employees towards their own style through seniority and influence. A
domineering leadership style will block the creation of trusted relationships, leaving others
without the space to supply guidance – with those at the top resistant to any sort of learning.

Where now?

Uber’s investigation resulted in a number of recommendations to overhaul its leadership,

including mandatory training for managers and new processes that will ensure executives
answer for their actions. None of this will result in change without a showing of humility,
which is why Kalanick should be praised for taking responsibility for Uber’s situation and
deciding to step down.

The firm must urgently define and communicate a clear set of positive values – a common
code for a huge, growing and constantly changing workforce to abide by – which will help
settle the murky waters. Leaders must be properly equipped and fostering an effective culture
must remain a top priority. Poor leadership is not just a problem for start-ups. Structures can
be equally problematic.

Appendix 7: Uber's Travis Kalanick Shows Leaders the Price of Obsession

By Robert Bruce Shaw July 14, 2020

Source: https://hcleadershipessentials.com/blogs/leadership/ubers-travis-kalanick-shows-
leaders-the-price-of-obsession, retrieved November, 2023. The below is an extract.

Kalanick’s story illustrates the challenge of obsessive leadership. He had the focus and drive
needed to overcome the myriad of obstacles that inevitably come with creating a
transformative service that confronts the existing order of things. At the same time, his story
reveals that obsession, if not managed well, is potentially toxic. His downfall highlights the
need to have well-designed safeguards in place to protect obsessive leaders, and their
organizations, from the predictable consequences of their all-in nature. In particular, these
leaders need strong teams and board members who value their strengths but can keep them
from acting in self-destructive ways.

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