What Working At Stripe Has Been Like • Hacker News Board

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#181

Post by xyzzy_plugh » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:01 AM UTC

superfrank wrote: post #104

_corym wrote: post #12

Kind of crazy how all these articles come out about what it's like working at Stripe and how to apply. Everyone I've talked to who has applied has not received a response from their application. Even in my most recent experience I wrote a cover letter, reached out to multiple Stripe recruiters. Most of them either ignored me, or said that they were not working on that role and said my status is still "pending". I ima…

I do mainly frontend work and am just shy of 10 years experience. My resume is solid and I can at least get my foot in the door at well known companies including FAANG. I'm not saying I'm going to get the job, but I feel like I can at least get a response. I was job hunting earlier this year due to my last company (a fintech start up) shutting down and Stripe was the only company that just handed me an immediate "No"…

I'm tangentially familiar with the process, so let me paint a picture.

Imagine you have enough high-quality candidates such that you could have every single employee interviewing candidates all day every day, doing no other work. What do you do?

In the real world, most engineers top out at one or two phone screens a week, and/or one or two on-site interviews a week. Sometimes more. Each is 45 minutes at least, usually an hour. Each involves writing deliberate, thoughtful feedback and a professional assessment. Candidates that do well lead to decision meetings that take more time for all the interviewers to discuss -- candidates that do poorly can circuit-break.

Then there is scheduling! Is there physical space available for the candidate to interview? Can we get all the necessary interviewers? What if one or more of them can't make it (sick, etc.)? What if the candidate needs to reschedule? Time zones? Holidays?

Imagine Stripe has 100 recruiters (this is at least accurate within an order of magnitude). What does the back-of-the-napkin math look like for their maximum interviewing bandwidth?

Hiring is a really hard problem, even for well-equipped organizations. Even the best in the world do it badly sometimes. And the anecdote cases tend to shout the loudest. Maybe you had a typo on your resume. Maybe other candidates looked better. Maybe there is a nasty rumor about you. Maybe the recruiter was having a bad day. Or maybe you were just unlucky and arbitrarily cut.

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#182

Post by absherwin » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:06 AM UTC

tptacek wrote: post #171

absherwin wrote: post #74

"every time I convince a Stripe customer to raise their prices ... we benefit directly" sounds like the exact words of an illegal cartel. While I doubt that that is Patrick's intent, if I were an antitrust attorney, this would convince me that the notion of payment processors as clearinghouses for price-fixing merits investigation. This is a great example of how one can do something well-meaning at small scale (Advis…

The idea that any form of price optimization among firms violates antitrust laws would put basically all management and marketing consulting at antitrust risk. This doesn’t sound plausible.

You will find that management consulting firms (and the companies that hire them) have fairly clear rules about how they approach and talk about pricing and competition to avoid the appearance of impropriety. Most notably, they would never ever: 1. Indicate that their advice always is to raise prices 2. They would never share the pricing advice they gave to a competitor.

I don't know if what Patrick does is problematic. It wouldn't surprise me if he was trying to be glib and his actual advice is more nuanced.

If one interprets it literally: Someone who receives advice from him to raise prices can look down Stripe's customer list and find its competition and feel confident that the competition will receive the same advice.

Again, I don't know what he does. All I know is that what he says if read by the right person would be sufficient to trigger their curiosity to ask for records of his correspondence and find out.

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#183

Post by digianarchist » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:06 AM UTC

thaeli wrote: post #180

billclerico wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing that often gets overlooked with respect to payments is consumer preference (and this is actually the primary driver of cost). Why do credit cards cost 2-3% to process? Because of expensive rewards programs given to the consumers who use the card. Why are there expensive rewards programs? Because consumers like them! And they insist on paying with a credit card because of them. Except in edge cases, merchant…

At many American gas stations, (I don't know how applicable this is in other countries) there is a lower "cash" price because the station doesn't have to pay credit card fees on the transaction. It's less convenient, because you have to park, go to the cashier, give them cash, go back to your car, fill up, go back to the cashier, get your change, and then go - versus put credit card in pump, fill up, go. It's ultimat…

Companies like GoCardless exist for this reason. Problem is that fraud is still a thing and cash payments over the internet aren’t possible.

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#184

Post by wolco2 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:09 AM UTC

Waterluvian wrote: post #127

abstractbarista wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Transferring those bits with just the right logic for each transaction scenario is what still costs something . I'm sure the margin is massively excessive today. But I don't think it can be quite 'effectively free'.

Debit e-transfers in Canada are free (and have been around a long time). It makes the Venmo thing a real head scratcher.

I pay for each etransfer what bank are you with?

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#185

Post by mbesto » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:12 AM UTC

mchusma wrote: post #122

I mean this in the most constructive way possible. As a stripe customer for 6 years, I effectively only care about reducing transaction costs. Period. Stripe's core business is being a part of a "credit card sales tax" that is substantial. Much of this is the fault of Visa/Mastercard/Amex, but that is the problem-space they exist in. Payments are transferring bits, and should be effectively free. If they want to "mak…

I understand the sentiment but I don't think you understand what exactly Stripe does that actually makes it cheaper than alternatives.

They are an ISO, payment processor, merchant bank, payfac and gateway all rolled into one.

Add all of those up and you can see why its actually, generally speaking, cheaper.

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#186

Post by mbesto » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:19 AM UTC

borroka wrote: post #158

pc wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two somewhat separate issues, I think. (1) The practical reality that a lot of people will have a suboptimal experience until we (both "we Stripe" and "we the industry") figure out more scalable ways to assess people. We'll do the best we can to identify promising people but a lot of people will get something somewhat functionally equivalent to a form rejection. You could argue that this is merely a priorit…

"The practical reality that a lot of people will have a suboptimal experience until we (both "we Stripe" and "we the industry") figure out more scalable ways to assess people." It is not inevitable and there are company that do recruiting better and other worse. For example, asking for a cover letter at Stripe and then ghosting people liberally even after multiple rounds of interview does not sound tremendously good…

> but respecting candidates should be a priority of any organization.

Sorry, but it's not. I'm not giving Stripe a pass here per se, but the priority of an org is to make money so that they can offer positions.

Scaling recruiting is hard. Just like you might want an org who see thousands and thousands of applications every day to act more benevolently, the opposite also holds true.

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#187

Post by wolco2 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:28 AM UTC

gamblor956 wrote: post #60

slumpt_ wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. I wouldn't be shocked if a lot of these blog posts are just astroturfing. Well designed astroturfing, nonetheless. Edit: Astroturfing is the wrong word, perhaps. What I mean to say is vocalized better in the replies. These all should be taken with a substantial grain of salt. A rock of salt?

It's possible for both (a) people to enjoy working at a company and (b) for that company's recruitment process to be abysmally bad. The people handling the recruiting functions are usually not the people you would be working with (unless you go into HR), and generally if HR starts ghosting you during the recruiting process it's because they're putting their efforts into the candidate they are trying to hire. EDIT: Co…

That's a tough choice. In the end a functioning hr/payroll department beats a good experience.

I've worked in both. When the company with a good environment closes we were all let go. They mishandled my last paycheck so I'm still waiting. No way to get references. Had to contact government to get seperation papers. The bad environment place that stressed you out and then let your department go for something out of your control. The firing process felt good. They provided career support offered a reasonable settlement package. Easy to use as a reference as they provided a contact #

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#188

Post by manmal » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:30 AM UTC

mchusma wrote: post #122

I mean this in the most constructive way possible. As a stripe customer for 6 years, I effectively only care about reducing transaction costs. Period. Stripe's core business is being a part of a "credit card sales tax" that is substantial. Much of this is the fault of Visa/Mastercard/Amex, but that is the problem-space they exist in. Payments are transferring bits, and should be effectively free. If they want to "mak…

Decent fraud protection alone is worth so much. I honestly think you are a bit spoiled by modern payment processors. Their tax is hard earned.

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#189

Post by manmal » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:34 AM UTC

ve55 wrote: post #3

What a wonderful advertisement for working at Stripe. The impact of long-form well-written essays like this is huge, and fits perfectly with the theme of the essay itself about helping others succeed at scale. I like the personal notes included a ton, e.g. mentioning that he has struggled with depression personally, which I wouldn't have guessed, even if naively so. Being open and helpful with those topics helps a lo…

Indeed, the part about choosing peers to form one’s worldview really struck home for me. Probably also applies to who you follow on Twitter or which sites you read (like this one).

Re: What Working At Stripe Has Been Like

#190

Post by wolco2 » Fri, Oct 09, 2020, 4:38 AM UTC

heavyset_go wrote: post #165

slumpt_ wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. I wouldn't be shocked if a lot of these blog posts are just astroturfing. Well designed astroturfing, nonetheless. Edit: Astroturfing is the wrong word, perhaps. What I mean to say is vocalized better in the replies. These all should be taken with a substantial grain of salt. A rock of salt?

It's like when you see a dozen Glassdoor reviews for an employer where the only recommendation to management is to "keep doing what you're doing" and that any complaints are "sour grapes" or from employees who can't handle "growing pains".

Any positive glassdoor post should be suspect. You generally visit glassdoor for three reasons.

1. You are researching a company.

2. You own or work in hr at a company or have been told to post a review by management.

3. You are angry/unhappy at your current role or that you were let go. You go on to warn others / get even.

Rare is the person who is working a company and is happy who decides to visit glassdoor and tell everyone how happy they are. Have you done this? Know anyone who would follow this chain of events?