Snapchat dragged into diversity row over ‘sexist and toxic culture’

Social media platform Snap has become the latest Silicon Valley giant to be engulfed in a row over diversity after a female ex-employee criticised its “sexist” and “toxic” culture.

Former software engineer Shannon Lubetich described becoming “incredibly frustrated” by the lack of women and people from ethnic minority backgrounds at the company, which runs the Snapchat app. In an interview with the US business news network Cheddar, Ms Lubetich condemned the macho “vibe” at the company where competition between departments was described as “a dick measuring contest” and male colleagues referred to a soccer league for staff as a “boys’ night”.

Snap has admitted that just 13 per cent of its tech staff and 22 per cent of senior managers are women.

The comments came six months after Ms Lubetich sent an internal email to 1,300 colleagues on her last working day at the company which listed the traits that can describe a software engineer, including “kind”, “compassionate”, “a woman” and “a person of colour”. The memo continued: “It’s fine if this list doesn’t describe you. But it’s not fine if you think, consciously or subconsciously that these traits prevent you from being a good engineer.”

In her interview yesterday, Ms Lubetich said she raised the San Francisco-based company’s problems with inclusion with its HR department when a meeting for all staff was addressed by “eight white men”.

She reported executive Tim Sehn to HR after he jokingly used the word “retarded” during a meeting and made a comment about penis enlargement in a conversation with a male colleague. He has since left the company.

Snap chief executive Evan Spiegel, who is married to supermodel Miranda Kerr, described Ms Lubetich’s email as “a really good wake-up call for us”.