Racially Charged Tweet Costs Alteryx CRO His Job

One week after a disparaging tweet about Chinese researchers, Alteryx‘s new chief revenue officer is looking for work. The tweet this week on Dean Darwin’s Twitter account, which many are describing as racist, called on the government to boot every Chinese researcher on visa out of the United States.

On Jan. 4, Alteryx announced the hiring of Darwin as CRO to lead the company’s go-to-market plan. That included worldwide sales, channels and all industry-specific go-to-market initiatives. In addition, he would drive Alteryx‘s next phase of growth, leveraging the company’s strategic alliance partners.

Alteryx is a supplier of analytic process automation (APA) software.

Disparaging Chinese Researchers

All that changed after Darwin posted the following tweet on Feb. 11:

“When is the US going to wake up and kick every Chinese researcher here on a visa out of the US and close this as an access to them?”

Someone identifying as an Alteryx customer and former employee, with the Twitter handle @meeshchoe, retweeted Darwin’s tweet, and said, “what is the stance of Alteryx regarding this post? How does he feel about other Asians at Alteryx?”

Another individual with the Twitter handle @connor_cox then retweeted @meeshchoe’s tweet, saying “Not sure an open racist in a leadership role is the way to go.” Furthermore, @Dansergrrl tweeted “This is me.. not shocked.”

On Feb. 17, @meeshchoe tweeted again, saying “@alteryx the silence is deafening. With a group like Alter.US to address these issues, as a customer I’m really disappointed as it feels like this issue fell on deaf ears. It’s duly noted where alteryx stands on racism and xenophobic comments.”

Furthermore, an individual with the twitter handle @lamabo8 tweeted “Alteryx employing someone racist? Color me shocked.”

On Feb. 18, Alteryx took action. And in its Feb. 19 filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company said Darwin had resigned.

“The resignation follows the company becoming aware of a social media post from Mr. Darwin that was not consistent with the company’s values,” it said.

Other members of Alteryx’s organization have taken over Darwin’s responsibilities, it said.

Darwin previously served as the senior vice president and general manager at Palo Alto Networks. He was responsible for creating and leading the Prisma business unit.

Darwin’s LinkedIn and Twitter accounts are down. We were unable to reach him for comment.