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Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

stripe.com

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Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#411
post #367
post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I worked nights and weekends all of October. Sorry to hear that. Why were you working nights and weekends?

Probably because they were scared of losing their job and were being asked to work harder.

Or they are a self motivated high achiever.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#412
post #202

This is the part I don't like. Stripe is a hugely successful company and they have no urgent material need to let people go. This is an optimization effort. I actually do believe that 'pruning' is a healthy thing for organizations, to enable them to be nimble and dynamic - however - obviously this comes at great social cost. The benefits of 'pruning' come at the cost of externalizing regular, creating real human chal…

[flagged]

"Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Please avoid generic ideological battle especially - it just makes threads predictable, therefore boring and eventually nasty.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#413

I would like to offer some tips for those faced with the potential of layoffs that I have compiled. I understand much of these come too late for those already affected, but for those worried about the prospect, these can help to ease the pain if it does happen: • Check if your company pays out unused PTO, sick days, etc as cash. If they do, do not use any of the applicable type(s) unless you are going to lose it. • H…

> unused PTO This is required in California.

We shouldn't assume everyone lives in California. They're giving general advice.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#414

I would like to offer some tips for those faced with the potential of layoffs that I have compiled. I understand much of these come too late for those already affected, but for those worried about the prospect, these can help to ease the pain if it does happen: • Check if your company pays out unused PTO, sick days, etc as cash. If they do, do not use any of the applicable type(s) unless you are going to lose it. • H…

> unused PTO This is required in California.

Good to know! But it's not required in every state in the US, let alone around the world, that's why I suggest people should check.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what I hate about the internet rage machine. No research was done by people automatically assuming that the company was just going to send the employees packing with “thoughts and prayers”. That’s very generous severance and the company doing right by its employees. I don’t know how long the process is for non US citizens. But in my over 25 year career, and changing jobs eight times as a software developer, i…

I had "trouble" finding work over the summer. But the actual details are that I was asking for $275k and $300k at two companies. Both gave me a verbal offers, but hiring froze. The third company, gasp, wanted me to come into their office (20 minutes down the street). I also lived through 2001 and 2008. I think the last 12 years of perpetual growth have created some amazing expectations from people. I can only hope th…

Listen, Software Developers should not give up whatever we got so far. If we pushed for these salaries and quality of life, hold on to it. Don’t sit here and tell the tribe “some of you want too much”.

Few professions earned this quality of life, doctors and lawyers, and I can promise they aren’t sitting around going “maybe we’re spoiled, maybe we oughtta curtail our expectations”.

No, take the life you have and don’t go backward. Most people working aren’t given an ounce from their industries, many of them still fight for basic stuff to this day.

Tech should not be okay with these levels of lay offs and still revere these companies. This is the stuff the car industry did when they just offshored jobs, and collapsed entire cities (Detroit). Why should we be okay with the same playbook?

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#416

“On Tuesday we set a new record for total daily transaction volume processed.” How does a company breaking records 36 hours ago conclude they need to lay off 14% of the workforce? Even with economic storm clouds on the horizon that seems very jumpy.

They look at _trends_ as opposed to where they are now. And perhaps each transaction currently loses them money, so the more transactions they have, the more money they lose. There are lots of factors that go into this than just one metric

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#417

I work for Stripe and got laid off this morning. Sucks because my manager was only told this morning, and didn't have a chance to talk about how well I was doing or take any part in the decision making. We'll at least I'll get a break. I worked nights and weekends all of October.

Ya'll are hyper focusing on the nights and weekends. That was my personal decision, not part of the culture.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#418

I work for Stripe and got laid off this morning. Sucks because my manager was only told this morning, and didn't have a chance to talk about how well I was doing or take any part in the decision making. We'll at least I'll get a break. I worked nights and weekends all of October.

> Sucks because my manager was only told this morning

As a manager I find their really curious. I guess they were trying to avoid leaks. I wonder how they chose who to lay off. Most recent performance rating? Next level managers impression?

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i hate this trend of ceos saying they take responsibility. Reminds me of lord farquuad, "some of you may die, but that is a price i'm willing to pay"

I think whatever a leader does which isn’t ritual suicide when announcing layoffs is going to get criticism. People in power hired when expecting an uptick and fired when expecting a downtick.

No, they’re making a business decision and they should simply treat it as such and avoid the whole “please understand how hard this is for me, the guy who will continue getting a very large paycheque” thing, that makes it worse.

If they just give it to you straight, there’s no bullshit - the people fired may be mad or upset but they'll be mad or upset regardless because being fired sucks. If they start hand-wringing, talking about how painful it was for them and how they take full responsibility people will ask “hang on, how exactly is this painful for you? how are you taking responsibility, what are you doing about it?”

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But, Stripe can't admit they made a major strategic blunder They quite literally say that? “In our view, we made two very consequential mistakes, and we want to highlight them here since they’re important: We were much too optimistic about the internet economy’s near-term growth in 2022 and 2023 and underestimated both the likelihood and impact of a broader slowdown. We grew operating costs too quickly. Buoyed by t…

There has not really been a broader slowdown in credit card processing volumes. Visa and MasterCard had good earnings and guidance last week. What’s really happened is exactly what BaseballPhysics said - the pace of Stripes share gain has slowed dramatically post-COVID.

How do you know more than Stripe's entire leadership team? Someone should hire you.
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