The trail between Silicon Valley executive Ellen Pao and prestigious venture capital outfit Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers continued Friday with one man on the stand: Stephen Hirschfeld, an independent investigator hired by Kleiner Perkins to look into allegations of discrimination against women at the firm.
The 7-hour slog of testimony from the witness described a firm in the throes of an identity crisis; a place where no one knew the rules, or if there were any rules, and where instead of following a leader, each employee operated in a silo, not sure in which direction they were going but still hoping to get ahead.
At some point, Kleiner Perkins transitioned from “a brand called KP … and it was more becoming a cult of personalities, and each personality had its own brand,” Hirschfeld said. “It had become tougher … an aggressive, tough environment.”
What each partner, man or woman, struggled with, Hirschfeld said, was how to get ahead — or even if they could get ahead.
No one “knew what the criteria was, or if there was criteria (or) if this was the kind of place that wanted to see people move up the food chain or not,” Hirschfeld said. “People didn’t even understand whether there was a true partnership track, whether people move up, or do they move down. Were they supposed to spend a couple years as a junior partner and move onto greener pastures somewhere else?”
For Pao, there was no getting ahead. She was fired from Kleiner Perkins in October 2012, seven years after joining the firm as a junior partner and chief of staff to premiere venture capitalist John Doerr. She had hopes of being promoted to a senior investing partner, and alleges that she was promised she would have such an opporunity. But she clashed with her colleagues, was excluded from business opportunities and firm meetings, and passed over for promotions, and in 2012 she sued Kleiner Perkins for gender discrimination, retaliation and failure to protect employees from discrimination. Pao, who is seeking $16 million, says she watched three male colleagues with similar or less experience get promoted while she remained a junior partner.
When she brought her complaints about the firm’s treatment of women and its boys-club culture to Kleiner Perkins management, Hirschfeld entered the picture. Kleiner Perkins hired Hirschfeld — an independent investigator with Hirschfeld Kraemer employment law firm in San Francisco — to investigate Pao’s allegations and also those of Trae Vassallo.
Vassallo had complained that male colleague Ajit Nazre had made sexual advances during a business meeting at a bar and in a hotel during a business trip, when he showed up at her room wearing only a bathrobe. Pao also had problems with Nazre; they had a consensual relationship while he was married, and things turned ugly after she ended it.
Hirschfeld first investigated Vassallo’s claims, which he found to be true, and Nazre got the boot from Kleiner. But he ultimately determined that Pao’s allegations were without merit.
Pao “had not been retaliated against, by anyone,” Hirschfeld said in his testimony.
He was paid more than $11,000 for his 20 hours of investigative work; he is being paid $575 per hour that he testifies. (He’s earned close to $7,000 so far and is returning to the witness stand Monday.)
Despite his findings, his testimony, which is based on what he was told by Pao and other partners at the firm whom he interviewed from December 2011 to March 2012, portrayed at times a workplace where “tough personalities” ruled and the increasingly crowded venture capital environment drove partners to become hypercompetitive.
This portrayal completely counters to the picture offered by Doerr, Pao’s former boss, who testified earlier this week. In his testimony, he said, emphatically and repeatedly, that the firm’s culture was based on a partnership of shared responsibility, shared trust and shared successes. He shunned “unparter-like” qualities such a being territorial or quick to claim credit for an investment — qualities he said Pao possessed.
Other highlights from Friday:
Pao didn’t offer many details of how she and Nazre first got together, Hirschfeld testified, and here is how he recounted their interview on the topic:
Hirschfeld asked, “Were you drunk?” She said “I don’t drink.” Hirschfeld asked, “Did he force you?” She said “No.” Hirschfeld asked, “Did he threaten you?” She “No.”
Pao told him “I was in his room. We had sex, it was a nightmare. Then we had sex three or four more times during the relationship.”
When Hirschfeld asked Kleiner Perkins for a copy of the firm’s discrimination policy, he said they could not locate one. He also said that wasn’t uncommon for a small partnership. “They don’t have the massive HR function with structures,” he testified.
Kleiner partner Sue Biglieri said in her testimony last week that the policy existed and was also referenced in every employee offer letter during her time at Kleiner.
Hirschfeld returns to the witness stand Monday at 9 a.m. When he wraps up, Pao will take the stand for the first time. Join us for our live blog Monday.
Photo: Ellen Pao, right, leaves the courthouse with her attorney Therese Lawless in San Francisco Calif., on Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2015. John Green/Bay Area News Group.
