After a video of Mr. Kalanick getting into a heated argument with a driver surfaced this month, Mr.<br />Kalanick said he would seek leadership help, prompting the search for a chief operating officer.<br />In a statement to Recode, he said, “The beliefs and approach to leadership<br />that have guided my career are inconsistent with what I saw and experienced at Uber.”<br />Mr. McClendon, in a statement, said he was returning to his hometown, Lawrence, Kan., after 30 years away.<br />Mr. Jones’s exit is problematic for Uber, as many current and former employees had seen him as a natural successor or counterpart to Mr. Kalanick.<br />Jeff Jones, Uber’s president of ride sharing, has left the company after just six months, Uber said on Sunday.<br />Mr. Jones was viewed by many as the so-called adult in the room — an executive with experience<br />as a leader at a public company that had undergone a period of intense crisis.<br />Uber hired Mr. McClendon, a highly respected engineer in Silicon Valley, from Google nearly two<br />years ago to work on the company’s mapping and autonomous vehicle technology initiatives.<br />Raffi Krikorian, a well-regarded director in Uber’s self-driving division, left the company last week,<br />while Gary Marcus, who joined Uber in December after Uber acquired his company, left this month.<br />2 executive, resigned after the ride-sharing company’s chief, Travis Kalanick, said<br />he needed leadership help and began a search for a chief operating officer.
