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Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

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Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#541

Post by __Parfait__ »

pugio wrote: post #502

Random shot here, but I work for a non profit interested in building a better kind of education (focused on programming, ml, and data science). We've been having a hard time figuring out how to hire qualified people to build top-notch educational content because we pay less than industry rates. The upside is that we do meaningful work, have good health care, decent pay, good work environment, (edit: also fully remote…

If you're in the US, try a marketing pivot to minorities & the disadvantaged, then seek grants. Just a shot in the dark though.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#542

Post by lazide »

naasking wrote: post #532
lazide wrote: post #522

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like the court system being adversarial, it’s that way because it’s the only thing that scales, for a number of reasons. The longer a company can avoid it/bigger they can be without it, the better everything is. At some point however, it’s inevitable. To answer your second question, because the ones who leave are often the ones with the most options and lowest risk to themselves if they are unemployed, which highly c…

> To answer your second question, because the ones who leave are often the ones with the most options and lowest risk to themselves if they are unemployed, which highly correlates with those who are the ‘best’. Maybe, but some of these "best" people might just leave after a round of layoffs anyway right? And now you're even more short-staffed than you wanted to be.

Yup!

Though the issue they are trying to solve appears to be having too many staff (overall).

Understaffing is almost always a local/team level concern.

As long as nothing important implodes after the cuts, it’s working as intended from their perspective.

The line and middle managers are the ones who always get really screwed in these situations, as they’re the ones responsible for figuring out how to keep who they need and keep things running (and growing!) while having the rug pulled out from under them staffing wise (and probably in other ways too).

This is when you figure out what (if any) power they have, how well they can prioritize, and what their personal character really is.

Will they level with people, cut things that don’t matter (as much), even if it’s a hard decision, give people flexibility where it matters, go up to bat for folks who it’s important that be done?

Or will they deflect, throw people under the bus to avoid making hard calls, and emotionally manipulate who’s left to keep things afloat while burning them out and underpaying them?

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#543

Post by reikonomusha »

naasking wrote: post #500
TorKlingberg wrote: post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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?

> As a manager I find their really curious. I guess they were trying to avoid leaks. That's something I don't quite get. This adversarial relationship between employees and employers and management is stupid. Why not tell the workforce you have to cut costs, so if you're thinking of changing careers now is the time. Whoever is left presumably wants to stay.

Presumably because you want to lay off 15%, not 50%.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#544

Post by TearsInTheRain »

whimsicalism wrote: post #468
thunkle wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

The culture is the product of many personal decisions. If I was working nights and (especially) weekends at my current employer (another big tech company), I would be told to stop.

why is that a good thing?

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#545

Post by toomuchtodo »

TearsInTheRain wrote: post #544
whimsicalism wrote: post #468

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The culture is the product of many personal decisions. If I was working nights and (especially) weekends at my current employer (another big tech company), I would be told to stop.

why is that a good thing?

To not drag down everyone else’s quality of life. Culture comes from the top. Defaults matter.

Overarching thesis is the people who work to live don’t want to be dragged by those who live to work. Not a judgement about someone’s passion.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#546

Post by naasking »

cldellow wrote: post #529
naasking wrote: post #500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a manager I find their really curious. I guess they were trying to avoid leaks. That's something I don't quite get. This adversarial relationship between employees and employers and management is stupid. Why not tell the workforce you have to cut costs, so if you're thinking of changing careers now is the time. Whoever is left presumably wants to stay.

Some possible reasons: You may not get the number of volunteers you need, so you still have to do layoffs. Except now, more people have been stressing about it for a longer period of time. The "low performers" who will have a hard time finding a new job elsewhere are unlikely to voluntarily leave. So you offer a buyout package to derisk the decision for them. But then the "high performers" who you'd rather retain mig…

Yes, there's stress associated with possible layoffs, but buyout packages and knowing it's not going to happen for, say 6 months, means there's loads of time to make the necessary adjustments. I think a big part of the stress is the suddenness of it all. Something like 50% of people are living paycheque to paycheque, so of course a sudden round of layoffs would be crazy stressful because there's a chance that your life is about to implode. Knowing you have 6 months to figure something out would not be nearly so bad.

So what I'm suggesting is that you announce ahead of time and let people who were considering a change go ahead.

Then when that deadline is reached, you offer those buyout packages to the low performers or others you don't want, until you reach your target.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#547

Post by nyuszika7h »

whimsicalism wrote: post #424
theptip wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s better to get generous severance than to have to come in and do bullshit made-up work.

At any time, you could choose not to do it and instead search for other jobs with basically the same result.

no, you'll be worse off if you do that because then you won't get severance. especially if you're not able to quickly land another job.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#548

Post by rgifford »

jasonshaev wrote: post #526
LudwigNagasena wrote: post #365

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am honestly amused by this. There are so many denigrating words that have their origin in or deep connotations with intellectual disability, yet somehow “r-word” is the one that gets all the attention. Though, I must admit I’ve seen people going even further and claiming that “crazy” is an ableist slur. And I am not sure which is worse, being selective or being consistent but annoying.

"The origins of the latest epithet in vogue are harmless." The origin of the word is irrelevant. Words mean things and can be harmful, regardless of the origin of the word. The meaning and context of words can change over time, regardless of the origin of the word. Bringing Charles Darwin into the conversation does not help your point. "Is it worse to have some condition of your birth used as a casual insult -- a rem…

Is "fat" harmful? Could we say a company overspending is fat or bloated without offending? What about "impotent" or "bald," are they harmful? Can we use them abstractly without offending? What about "anemic?"

Lots of conditions of being are generally disfavored as a condition of our biology. Referencing that disfavor abstractly doesn't bring it in to being. Ignoring it doesn't make it go away.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#549

Post by hikingsimulator »

abeppu wrote: post #525

I know this isn't new or unique to Stripe, but the language used in these announcements to distance leadership from their choices is always so slimy. "We're not 'firing' or 'terminating' anyone; some people are just 'impacted' by our announcement that we have to 'say goodbye'." It makes repeated mentions of those who are "leaving" (the subject is the former employee) and avoids active verbs where the founders are the…

It echoes the shift from "Personnel" to "Human Resources " to "Talent Acquisitions."

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#550

Post by rexreed »

celestialcheese wrote: post #539
rexreed wrote: post #245

Stripe stresses me out. I really cringe worrying about having too many financial eggs in the Stripe basket. But Paypal is no alternative and traditional CC processors are awful. How does one hedge their bets with Stripe? I worry one day we'll hit some transaction "trigger" and then all our money will get locked up in Stripe with no customer support recourse. I fear being "too successful" with no recourse if I depend…

Spread out transactions across multiple payment processors. We've backloaded authorize.net and braintree behind stripe to act as a failover and primary when the fees are cheaper.

How do you deal with recurring revenue subscriptions?
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