Accepted and ghosted: interviewing for a leadership position at Stripe
1703 points| danrocks | 4 years ago
1) About 35-40% of the interviewers started their questioning by saying "I will only need 20 minutes for this", while emphasizing it is an important leadership position that they are hiring for. So 20 minutes is all needed to identify "important, critical leaders"? What a strange thing to say - also a GREAT way to make candidates feel important and wanted!
2) There is significant shuffling of interviewers and schedules. One almost has to be on-call to be able to react quickly.
3) For an engineering manager position, I only interviewed with only technical person. To me it hints that Engineering MoM is not a very technical position.
4) Of all the people I spoke to, the hiring manager was the one I spoke the least with. The phone screen was one of the "I only need 20 minutes for this" calls. The other one was quite amusing, and is described below.
5) After the loop was done, the recruiter called me to congratulate me on passing, and started discussing details of the offer, including sending me a document described the equity program. Recruiter mentioned that the hiring manager would be calling me to discuss the position next.
6) SURPRISE INTERVIEW! I get a call from the hiring manager, he congratulates me on passing the loop, then as I prepare to ask questions about the role, he again says "I need to ask you two questions and need 20 minutes for this". Then proceeds to ask two random questions about platforms and process enforcement, then hangs up the call after I answer. Tells me he'd be calling in a week to discuss the position.
7) I get asked for references.
8) After passing the loop, have the recruiter discuss some details of the offer, have the hiring manager tell me they'd be calling me after a week, I get ghosted for about 3.5 weeks. References are contacted and feedback is confirmed positive.
9) I ping the recruiter to see when the offer is coming - it's not coming. They chose another candidate. I am fine with it, even after being offered verbally, but the ghosting part after wasting so much of my time seems almost intentional.
10) I call up a senior leader in the office I applied to, an acquaintance of mine. His answer: "don't come. It's a mess and a revolving door of people". I was shocked with the response.
11) I get called by the recruiter saying that another director saw my feedback and is very interested in talking to me and do an interview loop.
Guess I'm not joining, then.
I am ok with passing loops, being rejected, I've seen it all. But being ghosted after acceptance is a first. What a bizarre place this is.
[+] [-] dang|4 years ago|reply
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29387264&p=2
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29387264&p=3
We sometimes prune top-heavy comments to balance the subthreads out, but not in cases like this, for obvious reasons. There are some pretty interesting comments on the later pages too though.
[+] [-] temp7536|4 years ago|reply
Almost every fintech startup has the story of Patrick reaching out about an acquisition, mining them for information playing along and then ghosting - same thing for candidates. They leadership team, specifically Patrick and Will Gaybrick are extremely smart but have screwed over a ton of people - be very careful about trusting.
You don't hear anything about this online, they're incredibly effective at squashing hit pieces and have a huge amount of reporters and power brokers under their control. On HN and silicon valley Stripe and Patrick are a PR machine. Patrick has almost direct control over YC and HN, you'll notice that every single Stripe post automatically has pc as the first comment, regardless of anything else. Everything negative gets buried.
With Patrick now living in Woodside, Will on permanent vacation in Malibu and John permanently in Ireland the company is definitely a bit in chaos mode internally. Their entire people team has turned over and they're having major retention issues - so I'm not super surprised that stuff like this is starting to leak out.
I run a $XB fintech, and am afraid to use my name given the backlash.
[+] [-] temp3728|4 years ago|reply
Amongst their L2 team, Patrick and Will are described as the "killers". I guess maybe a bit of duplicity is required to build a company of that size...
[+] [-] barmstrong|4 years ago|reply
I've known Patrick since 2013 or so, and I have found him to be nothing but the highest integrity. Same for John. We are semi-competitors (not a ton of overlap) so you might find it strange for me to stick up for him like this, but I just think this description is wildly inaccurate. As one small example, Patrick has proactively told me when wanting to build competitive products, even when he didn't have to (very positive sum thinking).
He has direct control over reporters and YC? I'm sorry but this sounds like conspiracy theory.
People are living all over due to covid - so what. Remote is the future of work.
There are plenty of more reasonable Occam's razor explanations for some of what is being reported in this thread (and from the OP). You always have to assume ignorance over malice first. For example:
- companies often look at startups they may want to acquire, and decide to pass for various reasons (saying no more than yes is a good process), they then launch their own products (this is why they were looking at acquisitions in the first place), pretty normal
- any time you have thousand of interviews going on, you are bound to get some bad candidate experiences, I know for instance these happen in Coinbase periodically, and we try to minimize it for sure, but you will not get it to zero (especially when growing quickly)
- most rational explanation for OPs issue is that references were checked and came back luke warm/negative, so more were done which delayed it etc (they may not tell you this was the reason to protect sources btw), this is one of many potential reasons, i'm guessing, but benign explanations are more likely
- also, "discussing details of an offer" is not the same as receiving an offer
Anyway - if people had negative experiences, then feedback is great. I just hate to see HN jumping into tear downs and wild conjecture like this. Patrick and John are great founders we can all learn from, and yes human like all of us (not perfect). Let's all help each other improve here, and assume positive intent.
[+] [-] pc|4 years ago|reply
All of that said, I’d appreciate hearing from any founders who feel mistreated as part of an acquisition process. We make a fairly significant number of acquisitions and have never heard this directly before.
[+] [-] sailingparrot|4 years ago|reply
This sounds like such BS. They are just very reactive around PR, and Stripe while it might be hated internally (based on what you say), it is loved by external developers, so of course developers on HN will tend to have a positive opinion of anything related to it and vote accordingly. And they are quite a lot.
I almost downvoted you for going with the conspiracy theory route, but I like the irony of this post being on the top 5 on the front page and your comment being the top comment of that post, while complaining about him having "almost direct control" of HN and the press.
[+] [-] richcollins|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] coffeemug|4 years ago|reply
I can see how the intersection of these two properties may sometimes look like what you're describing, but from everything I've seen (which isn't too much, but it's enough) your interpretation of the facts really doesn't seem accurate.
(As a disclaimer, I do have a horse in this race because I have some stock, but I'm pretty certain I'm being objective about this)
TL;DR: me and you are looking at the same screen but aren't watching the same movie.
[+] [-] metagame|4 years ago|reply
dang has done nothing to deserve bad faith, and while I don't like Patrick, either, it's best to keep the knocks on the right doors.
[+] [-] gonehome|4 years ago|reply
Which is a shame because a lot of stuff they do is super cool, stripe press, increment (recently discontinued), blog posts, patio11 etc.
It seems like a great place in a lot of ways.
[+] [-] mfrye0|4 years ago|reply
I agree that the public has a rosy view of a lot of these $XB founders, when in reality it's lies and back stabbing behind the scenes.
[+] [-] cm2012|4 years ago|reply
To have the chance to be bought out for unfathomable sums at every step, and willingly go manage the headaches of a big and fast growing company (like this thread) instead?
[+] [-] quickthrower2|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] paganel|4 years ago|reply
That's why we still need a thing like Gawker to come back. Almost all of SV hated on Thiel for standing behind Trump but when it came to him bringing down Gawker nobody left a finger in Gawker's defense, and so that here we are, a multi-trillion dollar industry with no internal means to self-regulate ourselves.
[+] [-] rrjanbiah|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Ansil849|4 years ago|reply
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof, and all that... Can you list this 'huge amount of reporters' that Stripe has 'under their control'?
[+] [-] elsbree|4 years ago|reply
He's been active on social media so we know he's alive, and assume he parlayed our offer into a raise somewhere else. Ok, that happens, but to accept an offer and totally ghost? Jeez. I could have used those intervening weeks to interview more candidates had he just sent me a quick note, now I've got to backfill his position while also trying to fill the new ones that just opened... I guess hiring is a shitshow from both sides sometimes.
[+] [-] ggfgdjfhgjsdhfg|4 years ago|reply
Stripe is arrogant. I have many years of solid and proven experience. They called me out of the blue and I accepted to speak to the hiring manager. The recruiter sounded very arrogant in first conversation. She rushed me to schedule an interview but inexplicably postponed the interview with hiring manager by four weeks once I accepted.
When I reached out to an acquaintance of mine who had worked in Stripe in the interim, she said that they are simply in search of marquee brand names in your resume and it is a mess inside. As per her, the people who work there are simply too egotistic. Even people who just happened to have won the "lucky sperm/egg" lottery by joining a rocket ship early on considered themselves as geniuses.
In my experience in interviewing with them I felt the same. I sensed an undercurrent of arrogance, feeling of superiority, etc. They deserve praise for what they have accomplished so far and their valuation but it feels like it has gone to their head for many employees who work there now.
Needless to say, I didn't get the job. I'm not bitter but felt that they didn't treat me well in the process...
If you are interviewing there, beware.....
[+] [-] pc|4 years ago|reply
More than 10,000 people have interviewed at Stripe so far this year, so "several sigma bad" still happens to an unfortunate number of people. That said, we want those who interact with Stripe to come away having been treated professionally and respectfully, and our recruiting team cares about fixing our process failures. On behalf of Stripe, I apologize.
[+] [-] mamidon|4 years ago|reply
It's not that hard to just send a "thanks but no thanks" email.
To name names: Flymachine.io, Boulevard, and Pepper.
[+] [-] temp1410|4 years ago|reply
I get scheduled for a screening call with the hiring manager. The hiring manager doesn't call me. Recruiter follows up and offers to bring me onsite (no apology offered) without need for screen.
I'm shared the interview loop which has about 5 people (including the hiring manager who ghosted me).
Interviews were not very technical, just casual chats about management stories.
When it came time for the hiring manager to interview me, I got stood up. Again. Sat 45 minutes in the interview room with no one to check on me or inform if the HM slot will be replaced. Recruiting coordinator was unreachable.
At the end of the last interview, I told the recruiting walking me out about the no-show. They shrugged (zero apology again.)
This was followed up by 2.5 weeks of radio silence despite me seeking for updates.
Ultimately they responded to my follow up e-mails with standard rejection template.
[+] [-] ryandrake|4 years ago|reply
Hah! After 15 minutes of waiting, I'd get up, walk out of the interview room, and wander around the company, talking to random employees, trying to learn just how much of a shit show the place was, if only for morbid curiosity's sake.
[+] [-] danrocks|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nowherebeen|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rdtwo|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] PragmaticPulp|4 years ago|reply
From the outside, I wonder if Stripe has reached the point of notoriety where they can get away with poor hiring and even workplace practices because nobody wants to admit getting rejected by Stripe. Every negative anecdote I've seen has been shared under anonymity or strict confidentiality. I assume Stripe knows they're a hot commodity and therefore can get away with negative interview practices.
[+] [-] astrange|4 years ago|reply
https://twitter.com/isosteph/status/1459566899151396867
[+] [-] avl999|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lobocinza|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] _vertigo|4 years ago|reply
How was it that 3 other companies were able to fit and entire interview cycle in in the time it took Stripe to get back to me about my application? I turned the recruiter down and wrote it off as a fluke or some sort of mixup. I’ve been ghosted before, I’ve been auto-rejected before, but I’ve never been pseudo-ghosted wherein the recruiting team effectively ghosts you by ignoring your application for 6 weeks and then reached out to you once you already had offers in hand. Weird company, for sure.
[+] [-] dboreham|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hatesinterviews|4 years ago|reply
This is a sign that an organization is doing too many fucking interviews. When you get scheduled for an interview every day of the week, you are quite literally forced to stop caring about the impact of cancelling interviews last minute. The recruiters may try to find an alternate interviewer, but often the candidate gets shafted. I never realized how common forcing the candidate to reschedule was (I had never experienced it while interviewing) but it happens to probably half a dozen candidates per day at my 600 person company.
Stripe notoriously went through a “hyper growth” (doubling headcount year over year when already past several hundred employees) phase for a number of years. That is an unspeakable torture to subject an organization to.
[+] [-] tdeck|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] danrocks|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] shawnb576|4 years ago|reply
One of which was a 1:1 with the CTO, really positive stuff. Few days later I emailed a thanks and “would like to talk about next steps”. Nothing. Sent another a couple weeks later. Nada.
Several months later, got a reach out from a team, said I was interested, and the HM said ok yeah I’ll get you set up. Nothing.
I know I’m not the only one, I know of others who have had similar experiences.
It’s just poor form.
[+] [-] danrocks|4 years ago|reply
This. This is what I meant with this post above. Poor form. Incompatible with the supposed criticality of the position at stake. I still think Stripe is a great company, was just disappointed at being ignored after all the festivities.
[+] [-] deepspace|4 years ago|reply
But even worse, they do so in a particularly destructive way. The accept the business as a customer at first, and then suddenly withdraw service without warning, leaving the business scrambling to find an alternate credit card processor.
[+] [-] superStarTruth|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ichydkrsrnae|4 years ago|reply
Not.
In reality, a hiring manager clicked on your resume because an algorithm suggested it, told HR to setup a loop, and then promptly forgot you until the day you showed up.
If you're one of the lucky ones, your resume might have actually been read by a human.
The interviewers on the loop are probably not even on the team you'll join if hired.
There's a 90% chance they haven't even read the job requisition for the position you're applying for, if they could even find it. I've had to interview people blind without requisition or resume, and yes I did feel like an idiot both times, a rude one.
The person sitting across from you asking questions probably first learned of your very existence 15 minutes before it began; not because of disinterest, but because HR assigned the interview with that short of a window! re: x out sick, y in important meeting, etc.
All of this is true for at least 2 FAANGs and 1 MSFT in my experience as an interviewer and interviewee on over 50 loops over a decade.
What I'm saying is there is no spit or polish to the hiring process, not even at competitive companies, not even at the big ones, perhaps especially so because the assumption will be that you actually know what you're doing since you were bold enough to apply and even bolder to attend an interview loop at one of these "amazing" companies.
The musical chairs you experienced at Stripe, if explained at all, will be calendar conflicts, meeting overruns, sick employees, fire drills within, etc., all of those ambiguities that constantly interrupt IT. The show doesn't stop within because you're being interviewed on Wednesday. You are not the show. That $1000 suit you're wearing, the only suit you'll ever buy or ever wear ever again, bought you 60 minutes (or 20 at Stripe for Mgr of Mgrs).
The real explanation you will never know, but something as facile as the third guy on the loop not liking the fact that you have a full head of hair and he has none is actually sufficient, if you understand what I mean, that hiring is messy and opaque and human and, therefore, often ridiculous.
Would you believe one of these companies has had for decades now, as a core competency to hire for, “A tolerance for ambiguity”? I always loved that one.
[+] [-] codr7|4 years ago|reply
Decided to do the right thing for once and make a serious effort at investigating my options.
I started out very sincere and honest, but two months of being fucked over by companies left and right in the interview process definitely changed me.
In the end I found a nice position working with honest and empathic people, but the path that lead there was a total disaster.
[+] [-] colordrops|4 years ago|reply
After all this, she insisted that I sift through all the publicly listed positions and give her a sorted list of the ones I thought I was suited for, along with a checklist of how I matched each qualification. She then asked me to only select one, even though it wasn't clear what each group did or which role I was best qualified for or interested in. Then she asked for open slots to start doing interviews. Lastly she asked for a salary range. I let her know my FAANG salary, and she gasped and paused a bit. She quickly ended the discussion and said she'd call me in the next couple days with an interview schedule. Then she ghosted me for a month. She eventually mailed me and let me know they weren't ready to move forward.
By the way, the Woven Planet website is a mess, and the company probably is too. You'd never guess they are an automated driving division. They have all these ideas of a "future city" they are building and are paving over a section of land near Mt Fuji to build this "future city". They've hired Japanese speaking foreigners to do all these touchy-feely motivational videos that have nothing to do with self driving vehicles. Complete lack of focus. I lost a lot of respect for Toyota after this experience.
[+] [-] temp67531|4 years ago|reply
[0]: https://i.reddit.com/r/japanlife/comments/pi6mdk/psa_i_waste...
[+] [-] mavelikara|4 years ago|reply
Woven Planet's automated driving division was acquired from Lyft earlier this year [1]. They probably are still going through the integration.
[1]: https://investor.lyft.com/news-and-events/news/news-details/...
[+] [-] sokoloff|4 years ago|reply
Is a manager-of-managers ever a very technical position? I am one and almost nothing I do as part of that job requires any differentiated technical ability. An Excel pivot table is as a complex as I’d need to get by.
(I do technical items on the side so as to not lose my mind, but I’m not surprised by the hiring loop not being very technical.)
[+] [-] danrocks|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] simonebrunozzi|4 years ago|reply
About a year ago, I was reading Byrne Hobart's excellent newsletter on financial stuff (no affiliation, but it's well worth its money), and I see an ad where they're looking for a head of strategy.
To apply, you simply had to email John Collison (the youngest of the Collison brothers) with your idea about it.
I thought I had a shot, given my experiences, and decided to spend several hours to prepare a memo, that I shared with them.
Of course, I thought, after all this work, and considering that this candidature comes from a respected, still niche, newsletter, and given my resume and past experience (ex AWS - first hire in Europe in 2008 -, ex VMware, etc - I'm not trying to beat my chest here, just stating that I objectively had a good resume for a position like this), at least I should get one chance to interview, or worst case, a simple but kind "we saw your note, not interested, good luck".
Of course, as you can guess, I've never heard back. Reached out again after a couple of weeks, and still nothing from them.
Reached out to a friend who works at Stripe, asked him if he could help with my application. He says he will try, but then... nothing.
Ok, Stripe, I guess you won't have me.
Side note: compare that with how I got my job at Amazon Web Services, back in 2008 [1]. Completely different experience.
Eventually, after I gave up on this opportunity, I decided to make the memo into a blog post [0], omitting or tweaking a few minor details. It might be worth a read, and I would love to hear your thoughts on it.
[0]: https://simon.medium.com/stripes-opportunity-reinventing-cus...
[1]: https://simon.medium.com/2008-how-i-got-hired-by-amazon-com-...
[+] [-] shrimpx|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 3x3m3|4 years ago|reply
but lol this strategy memo is so oblivious to the company's current strategy and just unfit. Not surprised it did't get a reply.
It's a net negative. Zero useful thoughts in there for Stripe's founders.
The worst part is trying to sound smart while expressing really superficial thoughts. No bigger sign of incompetence.
[+] [-] mercy_dude|4 years ago|reply
Three days later I got one of those generic thank you for applying in Stripe emails. I reached out to the recruiter and asked for specific feedback and explained my interview experience but I heard nothing back.
I spent about 1.5days of my personal time off which at my current market rate is close to 1k USD. I sincerely believe we SWE should be paid to do the interviews at a prorated basis of their salaries or at least some level of expenses. With virtual on-site companies basically don’t have to do anything other than employing a few sourcers to hire potential candidates which incentivizes these sort of poor candidate experience.
[+] [-] asah|4 years ago|reply
1. when you're first contacted by a recruiter, company provides a written set of values/principles that the company expects from its recruiters and staff, contact info if you feel the company didn't live up to these principles, or have a suggestion for how to improve the process.
2. tie x% of recruiter comp to good behavior, and y% of interviewers.
3. automatically send surveys to candidates (both accepted and rejected) and check to see if you feel they could've streamlined the process or made it more pleasant. Capture an NPS score. Offer a cash bonus thank-you and another for referring friends.
other ideas?