Meet the power players who really run $69 billion Uber
Travis Kalanick may be the public face of Uber, but he hasn't built the company by himself.
Like any chief executive, Kalanick leans heavily on his team and direct reports to manage all parts of the business, from people operations internally to putting out regulatory fires externally.
As Uber faces challenges on all fronts in 2016, here's who is leading the charge internally to make transportation "as reliable as running water."
Jeff Jones is Uber's new president of ridesharing.
TargetWhen Travis Kalanick asked Jeff Jones how well he did on his TED talk, the then-Target CMO gave him a B-minus and told him he needed to fix his talking points.
That's harsh feedback for Kalanick, but also a valuable insight. As Uber has tried to rein in his free-wheeling city offices, it's needed to fix its global branding problems.
In August, Uber announced that it had poached Jones from Target to become its president of ridesharing, overseeing all of its operations, marketing, and customer support.
Ryan Graves was the company's first employee and first CEO.
REUTERS/Beck DiefenbachWhen Graves responded "heres a tip. email me:)" to a tweet about a startup job, there was no way of knowing Uber would become the $62 billion company it is today.
Graves joined and became its first CEO and general manager from February 2010 until December 2010. At that point, Graves was "super pumped" that Kalanick (who was "frickin' pumped") would take over the role.
Graves led Uber's international expansion and growth as its former SVP and head of global operations until Jones joined the company. Graves' new role at the company is as its resident entrepreneur and builder, overseeing Uber's people operations and UberEverything along with working with Kalanick on special projects.
He's also on Uber's board.
Austin Geidt is in charge of expanding Uber everywhere.
Austin Geidt/TwitterJoining the ride-hailing startup after battling a drug addiction, Geidt was the fourth hire at Uber and has been with the company ever since.
"I'm so proud of the work my team has done at Uber and the work I've done at Uber. But it's not the proudest thing I've done, right? I'm more proud of being sober," she said at a Fortune conference. "I just have perspective."
As head of global expansion, she's taken Uber from one city to more than 100 and plots on a map where Uber is going next.
If that wasn't enough of a job, she also oversees the PRO team, Uber's equivalent to business ops, that's in charge of streamlining the company. One of her special projects is Uber's 1 Million Women initiative to sign up 1 million women to the platform by 2020.
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