TB Bardlavens’ Post

For the past week or so I've hesitated speaking on Zillow's recent decision to shutdown Zillow Offers, especially because I have the deepest empathy for those 2,000+ folx who inevitably lost their jobs due to the decision. That said, it's also disingenuous to readily stand by while the company spins it's failures to make people feel good about losing their jobs, when it was preventable. I joined Zillow back in February 2019 to help lead the Zillow Offers team, we knew almost 99% of people who clicked, "Get an offer from Zillow" would not make it to the end of the process. We knew back then how many home sellers felt jilted, offended, etc. by this product. In design and research we worked tirelessly to surface this feedback and experiences to both Product and Sales executives in the company. They didn't care, they were more pissed that we were bringing negative information to them than they were motivated to fix a broken product experience built on a faulty asset acquisition and resale strategy.  I remember working with a data scientist to surface our need, as a business, to take a nuanced approach to how we identify markets to enter and how to engage with the local community. Buying homes using apps in Portland is very different than doing so in Fort Collins, but they took the same approach with every city and found greater success in cities where there a pre-existing competitor (i.e. OpenDoor) than in cities where we were the first. Furthermore the Product Management culture, all the way up to the VP of Product at the time, was likely one of the most toxic, abusive, paternalistic cultures I've ever experienced in my career. They valued old-school growth hacks from 2007 over taking user-centered, data-informed, research-backed approaches. They spent more time flexing and building decks that drove an internal narrative of Sellers being happy, than actually addressing real and persistent product problems that ultimately led most sellers down a path where they didn't know what to expect, didn't understand the process and were inundated with calls and scheduling. On the flip-side, they were so unable to develop clear strategy or products to effectively assess the homes they were purchasing to be able to resale. Many of these leaders, were leaders not on their merit, success or competency, but simply because they stayed at the company long enough that their titles grew as the company did. This toxic, abusive culture and poor leadership resulted in almost every single customer-facing ZO product designer to leave the company. I can say more, but I'll just end with this note: To those 2,000+ people who lost their jobs with the killing of Zillow Offers—blame leadership, not the market, not shifting winds or any other story you've been sold. Blame the folx who cared more about click-through rates and using carebear emojis, than helping build great culture and products that would have ensured you kept your job. #zillowoffers #zillowfailure