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Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

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Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#831

Post by maerF0x0 »

As a general comment about fears of layoffs and being rehired. Keep in mind the scale of these layoffs vs jobs reports. Sep Jobs report 263000[1] jobs added. The layoffs this year (according to layoffs.fyi) are about 195000-- less than a single month's added. Yes they're not the same job, yes they're likely at a lower total comp. But we're not talking about everyone having No job like in the great depression. We're talking about people having to shift into the sectors that are growing and maybe tighten up their budgets.

Now, as for where my real concern is imagine making even $15 an hour and finding out that necessities[2] are outpacing your already pay check to pay check life? I really feel for those folks who didn't over leverage themselves and are suffering despite working full time.

Remember that fear is a tool the capital class uses as leverage against those without options (or who believe they dont have options). Things like getting you to accept lower pay than they know they can offer, scaring you to take on excess load so they can fire your friends, and controlling the narrative and getting in front of it so they can profit when the masses shift sentiment. Focus on making yourself independent, resilient, and generally informed, and you'll have far more negotiating power.

[1]: https://blog.dol.gov/2022/10/07/september-2022-jobs-report-s...

[2]: https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2022/consumer-prices-up-9-1-per... eg Fuel to get to work is up 40% .

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#832

Post by anonym29 »

TideAd wrote: post #448
anonym29 wrote: post #311

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…

You say 40+ interviews. Is this something you've done? I did 10 last time I was on the market that was about my limit. 40 sounds like it would take inhuman stamina.

I was happily employed, but wanted to stress test this strategy (and keep myself sharp, as practice in case anything did happen), and several years ago I did. Between a Wednesday morning and a Friday afternoon, I had set up over 40 interviews in the 2 week period starting the following Monday. I additionally scheduled a few more on Monday, for a total of 50+ round 1 interviews. I don't remember the exact numbers, but I had low double digit round 2s and single digit round 3s scheduled as well, with many more round 2 requests in the weeks following the resolution of this test.

It was exhausting, and the exhaustion scaled nonlinearly. By the end, I cancelled the last 5-10 first interviews, and all of the second/third round interviews. I did so with the same tact I recommend regarding replying to recruiters, and made no bad blood in the process. Several of the recruiters got such positive feedback from some of the clients that they told me I was welcome to apply again whenever I was ready.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#833

Post by anonym29 »

jeffbee wrote: post #432
anonym29 wrote: post #311

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…

Most important bullet point whenever you are leaving a company: * Never sign anything! Unless there is a substantial check attached, you have no reason to sign any agreement with the employer you are leaving. Politely refuse, and if they insist, ask for compensation.

I had to drop off equipment once towards the end of a contract while the usual people responsible for accepting the return were out of office. I found the head of IT, typed up a paper saying "Anonym29 returned their equipment to Mr. Head of IT on [date] at [time]", put my signature on it, got his signature on it, made a copy for him, and kept the original - I didn't want the risk of the chain of custody getting mixed up and possibly have the company come after me for the cost of the equipment.

So maybe not "never sign anything" so much as "exercise good judgement in deciding what to sign, after carefully evaluating whether it will help you or hurt you to sign it"? Just a thought.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#834

Post by oblio »

jacobsenscott wrote: post #766
oblio wrote: post #747

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel most decent engineers can get rehired elsewhere with 14 weeks of runway. Oh, sweet summer children and children of recession free economies for IT. If job openings fall to 10-20-30% of current ones and tens, hundreds of thousands of IT workers are fired, good luck getting hired quickly, when any of the few good remaining job opening has hundreds of good applicants. We'll be back to the days of: Sure, you can…

Can we please retire this "sweet summer child" thing? It is annoying af, rude, and likely never written by anyone over 30.

> and likely never written by anyone over 30.

Well, George RR Martin would be super happy to know he's under 30 :-)

For what it's worth, I'm not under 30 either.

It's light-hearted and slightly irreverent. Whimsical, one might say.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#835

Post by VirusNewbie »

sulam wrote: post #763
confidantlake wrote: post #752

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, did the google interview late this summer and then they froze hiring. Got contacted by a recruiter from google last month. Told him I had already interviewed. He told me I should just wait until the freeze is over and not interview again.

The freeze has been over for weeks. I do an interview every week, and my team has two open roles right now.

to be fair, I'm pretty sure Google was doing interviews even when things were completely frozen. I applied in May, did interviews in June/july, passed HC in July and was frozen out for months and months. Sounds like things are just starting to open back up.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#836

Post by anonym29 »

dangerwill wrote: post #565
anonym29 wrote: post #311

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…

"Build up a rolodex of recruiters." - Given the sheer amount of LinkedIn spam I get from all over the world and for all kinds of roles, I doubt that most recruiters see any individual SWE on LinkedIn as anything other than a cell in a spreadsheet, no matter how friendly you are to them over email.

I can personally attest otherwise. There are many like this, and many of those aren't even open to building a real relationship with their recruitees, but that seems to become apparent pretty quickly when trying to establish a friendly relationship. I have found that I get better placements and better rates of follow-up interview rounds with the ones I do have a stronger connection with, which is why I mention this. You don't have to send them Christmas cards or anything - just name and number/email of the ones you didn't hate, and maybe a star next to the ones you got along really well with :)

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#837

Post by anonym29 »

fermentation wrote: post #445
anonym29 wrote: post #311

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…

Is it really just as simple as adding random SWEs and recruiters?

I went from no degree and zero paid experience to six figure income in about 1 year, and big tech by 3 years, utilizing this strategy. The only job I ever cold applied for my first one. Recruiters (internal and external) have basically driven my entire career since then :)

I think job hunting is kind of like dating, in that the "match" between parties has significance, but it also largely a numbers game. Increasing your numbers == increasing your opportunities.

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#838

Post by zepppotemkin »

sirsinsalot wrote: post #753
oblio wrote: post #747

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel most decent engineers can get rehired elsewhere with 14 weeks of runway. Oh, sweet summer children and children of recession free economies for IT. If job openings fall to 10-20-30% of current ones and tens, hundreds of thousands of IT workers are fired, good luck getting hired quickly, when any of the few good remaining job opening has hundreds of good applicants. We'll be back to the days of: Sure, you can…

I've been a continuously hired coder for 20 years, with zero qualifications, and have never experienced anything but demand even in recession. There's always non FAANG boring crud apps to code.

I had some rough spots in 2008-2010 a good 3-4 month or so gap in steady employment and what I did get afterwards wasn't great but it was ok

I learned the importance of saving during the good times so I'm less worried now

but it would be foolish to pretend the growth of many was stunted during bad times

Re: Stripe laying off around 14% of workforce

#839

Post by oblio »

andirk wrote: post #817
oblio wrote: post #747

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel most decent engineers can get rehired elsewhere with 14 weeks of runway. Oh, sweet summer children and children of recession free economies for IT. If job openings fall to 10-20-30% of current ones and tens, hundreds of thousands of IT workers are fired, good luck getting hired quickly, when any of the few good remaining job opening has hundreds of good applicants. We'll be back to the days of: Sure, you can…

Why does this person talk like they live on a Roman reenactment battlefield AND somehow with all those words said nothing of substance? Software engineers are needed all over the place and thus are often easily employable.

> Software engineers are needed all over the place and thus are often easily employable.

Needed as in must have or nice to have?

There are tons of devs creating tons of tech for the sake of creating tech. Cryptocurrencies come to mind, or all those half baked government automation projects where the digital version is in the end slower and more error prone (plus with limited or no recourse in case of failure).

And secondly, sure, they are, but what happens when you have 10 million devs and 8 million dev jobs? Past success is not a guarantee of future performance. Detroit and the car company cities and towns were amazing places to live in, and car engineer jobs were great, decades ago. Until they stopped being great.

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