Like, first of all, the toxicity described is itself so multi-dimensional. I mean there's the gender dimension obv, but so many other facets like ethnicity, race... even geography. For example I notice that even among what appears to have been a disproportionately immigrant, first-, and possibly second-generation African staff... that most of the women raising the allegations are West African (specifically, Nigerian) and multiple are of Yoruba descent (relevant bc, judging by his name, the CEO is as well) which at least one woman alluded to likely influencing relations further. Then, an ADOS-centered argument could probably be made (correctly, imho) that a disproportionately immigrant, first-, or second-generation African staff may have blindspots (or, tbf, bias) when it comes to the distinct roots (no pun intended), history, relevance, and (unequivocally Black American) cultural nuances of the Okayplayer brand specifically. And now there's multiple conversations brewing on twitter about the white female founding/ownership of Okayafrica, including how that may have shaped the political economy between them, the (black male) leadership/"face" of the brand, and the completely disempowered (predominantly black female) staff (I'm slightly less conflicted on this last issue given what we know about how capital is distributed in the US... the money to fund black spaces still has to come from somewhere, and I don't think black women can wait for racial wealth gap closure/diversification of the ownership class before being treated better/more fairly in the workplace).

I mean, where does one even begin?? Any one of these factors alone could have shaped okayplayer's business performance and outcomes, talk more of their intersection.

Other thing is - it's striking how reproducible, recognizable, and consistent the features of toxic work environments are. Regardless of industry. Like, I was mildly triggered reading some of these accounts lol. I'm not sure if it all should be attributed to scrappy startup culture either... Okayplayer is a decades-old brand and Okayafrica founded in 2011, no?? There's just certain policies and practices that should be well-established in orgs that age, imho. And if the financial struggles these women allude to are real, then there's likely been leadership issues even before this CEO (if not in style, perhaps structure).

I feel for these women bc I've worked in similarly toxic environments and know how it can affect ones wellbeing, and I hope the CEO follows up his departure with some serious learning, introspection, training, and transformation. Painful issues aside, it also just reads like he was a CEO overwhelmed, and perhaps out of his depth, and it probably affected the growth/evolution of the other okayniches which is unfortunate. I read Okayplayer has procured some external biz advisory services about next steps and, if true, that's comforting to hear. Maybe they should consider pulling an Alphabet and create an "OKP" or "Okaymedia" parent/umbrella brand identity, along with a corresponding leadership suite (of people with proven expertise running successful media enterprises) who focus exclusively on the unsexy stuff (eg operations, finance, HR, IT). Then run Okayplayer, Okayafrica, and other divisions with a middle management structure responsible for their own content, marketing, comms/engagement, business dev, etc. That way, if other okayunicorns (like Okayafrica) were to take off, of course it makes sense for them to have bigger budgets, exposure, etc but it should be able to occur without affecting other divisions or the parent/umbrella brand identity as a whole (as I feel Okayafrica in some ways sidelined Okayplayer under this CEOs leadership). After all, it's not like Google Maps growth compromised Gmail, right? And neither did the failure of Google+.

I'm sure the brand will sort itself out and pull through better than ever tho.