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WrkRiot Collapses Amongst Allegations of Fraud (qz.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the behind-the-scenes-of-Silicon-Valley dept.

HockeyPuck quotes a report from New York Times: This week, WrkRiot, began unraveling in a highly public fashion (Warning: may be paywalled). Its former head of marketing revealed that the start-up had been mired in internal chaos and had sometimes paid employees in cashier's checks before delaying payment... Penny Kim, the former marketing director at WrkRiot, wrote about her experience at the company -- a story that consists of alleged deceptions, including forged wire transfer receipts, late paychecks, and lies from executives. Her entire story can be found in a Medium post titled "I Got Scammed By A Silicon Valley Startup." Quartz reports: "Here's the story Kim lays out in her Medium post: In May 2016, after three interviews, she says she accepted the role of marketing director at 1for.one, one of WrkRiot's earlier incarnations. From the beginning, things didn't seem quite right, she says. The CEO, Isaac Choi, hired one of her direct reports without consulting her. A promised $4 million marketing budget never materialized. At investor meetings, the co-founders 'talked about themselves, their connections, and their qualifications for 30 minutes' rather than the product, which they touted as the next 'Credit Karma of LinkedIn.' The software engineering team was largely made up of young Chinese employees relying on visas sponsored by the company to remain in the U.S., Kim says. After repeated inquiring about salaries, Kim alleges, Choi sent forged Wells Fargo wire transfer receipts to 17 employees, and told them that if the money wasn't in their accounts that it was their responsibility to follow up with their banks. Kim ended up filing wage claims with the state of California as the paychecks stopped coming. Kim claims Choi fired her without cause and owes her back wages, a promised $10,000 relocation bonus, and three months of severance worth $50,000, as negotiated in her contract. A series of former employees, advisors, and even the company's former CTO have since denounced WrkRiot and its leadership, in particular Choi."

7 of 120 comments (clear)

  1. A *Minimum* of Journalistic Skill by RobotRunAmok · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...that's all anybody is really expecting. Like, one sentence, a parenthetical phrase, even, describing WTF WrkRiot is, what they make, something, anything, in the first paragraph of the summary to make me care about this. We get a "Credit Karma of LinkedIn" buried somewhere in the middle, which -- fascinating-ly -- is actually LESS than descriptive or useful.

    Slashdot, I love you guys, but most days you make it really, really tough...

    1. Re:A *Minimum* of Journalistic Skill by queazocotal · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Relevant xkcd is relevant. https://xkcd.com/1060/

  2. Fucked Company 2.0 by 0100010001010011 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    We need a new FuckedCompany for this bubble. That was always some good reading.

    1. Re:Fucked Company 2.0 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It should be called "H-1B'd" considering how many of these failure stories involve companies who fraudulently claim no Americans are available to work, then fraudulently import workers for their sweatshops.

  3. Startups are mostly garbage, news at 11 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    For every legit startup, there are 9 others that are garbage. That ratio is being generous.

    1. Re:Startups are mostly garbage, news at 11 by Darinbob · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Most startups I've seen have really awful workers; no real experience in creating a real product that actually makes it to market. I've worked at a few places that had been startups or were pre-IPO but out of the startup phase, and most of the existing code bases were rotten and the hardware was rushed together. So the work generally involves throwing out as much of the startup stuff as you can get away with and starting over with something that actually works, and when you have to keep the original stuff then you always have a new "you won't believe how stupid..." story for your friends.

      The thing is, people at startups most often have no actual desire to get to market, some of these companies have a plan to get bought out by someone else. When they do want to make an actual product the primary goal is still to RUSH as fast as you can before funding runs out or the investors get bored; rush to get a mockup, rush to get a demo, rush to add a prospective customer's favorite feature, rush to change the entire focus of the company, and get all that rushing done by Friday or there's no job left on Monday. There is zero incentive to have quality, quality is a hindrance that only slows down the rush. Stopping and thinking can only be done on your own time, and startups insist that you have no time of your own anyway.

      There's a LOT of ground in between no-nothing startup and a megacorp though, plenty of places outside of startups where you can make a difference and be important and actually have a product make it to customers.

      If you're making 200K less, then you're a manager and not a real worker anyway, or an exec and even less able to do real work.

  4. Re:What Employee Works Without Pay? by queazocotal · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Well, if you are required to work at the company to stay in the country...