Rob Chesnut is a Senior Advisor to Airbnb, Inc. a role he transitioned to in March 2020 after over 4 years as Airbnb’s General Counsel and Chief Ethics Officer of Airbnb Inc. Airbnb, Inc. is a $30 billion private global travel and payments company that operates an online marketplace and hospitality service for people to rent short-term lodging including homes, apartments, and rooms, and to participate in local experiences. The company has over 4 million lodging listings in 65,000 cities and 191 countries and has facilitated over 500 million guest check ins.
Rob is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the University of Virginia. He worked for 14 years with the U.S. Justice Department, including 10 years as an Assistant United States Attorney in Northern Virginia where he handled the prosecution of CIA employee Aldrich Ames. He is the recipient of the Justice Department’s John Marshall Award for litigation, and the CIA’s Outstanding Service Medallion.
Rob spent 10 years at eBay, Inc., where he was a member of the executive leadership team and built the Internet’s first ecommerce platform Trust and Safety department. Rob was eBay’s spokesperson for site policies and fraud, and he was interviewed in over 200 television, newspaper, radio, and magazine stories for his pioneering role in combating Internet fraud, including the Oprah Winfrey show.
Rob joined Airbnb in the spring of 2016, where he grew the legal team from 30 to over 150 legal professionals in 20 offices around the world. His team led initiatives to promote home sharing and address regulatory issues with local governments and landlords around the world. Rob developed a popular interactive employee program, Integrity Belongs Here, to help drive ethics throughout the culture at the company. He speaks at businesses and colleges around the world, and his book “Intentional Integrity: How Smart Companies Can Lead an Ethical Revolution” will be published by St. Martin’s Press in July 2020. Rob works with companies to help them develop strategies to drive integrity into their culture and can be reached at www.intentionalintegrity.com.
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 Intentional IntegrityHow Smart Companies Can Lead an Ethical Revolution
St. Martin's Press
JULY 2020 RELEASE. “Show of hands — who in this group has integrity?” It’s with this direct and often uncomfortable question that Robert Chesnut, General Counsel of Airbnb, begins every presentation to new employees. In Intentional Integrity, Chesnut offers a six-step process for leaders to foster and manage a culture of integrity at work. We will always need governments to manage defense, infrastructure, and basic societal functions. But, Chesnut argues, the private sector has the responsibility to use sensitivity and flexibility to make broader progress—if they act with integrity. |
Robert Chesnut mentioned by Glassdoor on how to operate with compassion and empathy during difficult times.
Financial Post features Robert Chesnut in an article on balancing operations with increasingly fearful workers.
Law.com features Robert Chesnut and his work on educating employees on company ethics.
Robert Chesnut announced as General Counsel of Airbnb.
Read Robert’s op-ed for LinkedIn on online innovation.
"Rob is the BEST presenter and public speaker!"
"Fantastic presentation. Excellent speaker. Very engaging. A difficult topic made interesting."
"Loved it. Rob is relatable, entertaining and has the perfect energy level for this. I hope every single person gets this experience."
"I thought that Rob was incredible! The presentation was interactive, lively, and very interesting. Loved it."
"Rob is a highly talented presenter who is able to capture his audience even with a seemingly boring topic. It was great to go through lots of real examples that actually happened at Airbnb and have an interactive discussion on many of them. That really engaged the audience."
Praise for Intentional Integrity "Drawing on considerable experience with the nuances and circumstances of integrity violations at Airbnb, Chesnut offers plentiful examples of common integrity issues... He is especially good on such matters as enforcing consequences and handling situations involving violators who are high-performing employees. Valuable reading for companies that want to get serious about workplace ethics."
—Kirkus Reviews
"This is the rare fully realized look at not just what integrity means in the context of business, but how to make it second nature in the workplace. Business leaders should take note."
—Publishers Weekly
"Stop talking about bringing your values to work and learn how to actually DO it!"
—Kim Scott, author of Radical Candor
"The ethical expectations for companies is wonderfully changing from 'do no evil' to 'do good.' Companies and their leaders need to put ethics and integrity at the center of their mission and culture. Rob is an insider who's combined doing good with doing business well in two iconic Silicon Valley companies. His book contains smart, practical advice for anyone looking to do good and do well."
—Reid Hoffman, co-founder of Linkedin and author of Blitzscaling
"No one has wrestled with more difficult business integrity challenges over the last 20 years than Rob. His insights will instruct you how to drive integrity into your culture. Now, more than ever, we need someone to lead a constructive, direct conversation about integrity in business—Rob delivers."
—Meg Whitman, CEO of Quibi, former CEO of HP and eBay Inc.
"Rob and I were peers at Airbnb and together we helped build a culture and public-facing brand with integrity as a core value. Not only was the work strategically brilliant but under Rob's leadership, it was embedded into the very heart of the company. Rob brings creativity, empathy, credibility and a great sense of humor to this important topic — he makes ethics human and fun."
—Jonathan Mildenhall, co-founder and CEO, TwentyFirstCenturyBrand