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Accepted and ghosted: interviewing for a leadership position at Stripe

1703 points danrocks | 5 comments | 30 Nov 21 00:30 UTC | HN request time: 0.002s | source

Recently I interviewed with Stripe for an engineering MoM (Manager of Managers) for one of their teams. I interview regularly, so I am used to many types of processes, feedback mechanisms, and so on. I won't go into details about the questions because there's nothing special about them, but I wanted to share some details of my experience for people thinking of interviewing there.

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.

1. simonebrunozzi ◴[30 Nov 21 06:37 UTC] No.29389572[source]▶
Here's my own little story. (not as bad as the OP)

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-...

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2. shrimpx ◴[30 Nov 21 10:35 UTC] No.29390770[source]▶
So you just sent “a memo” for an ad you found on a newsletter and never heard back, and this is shocking somehow?
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3. simonebrunozzi ◴[30 Nov 21 10:44 UTC] No.29390811[source]▶
Not exactly. The newsletter is a paid, niche newsletter, and the author stated that you could apply to the job by directly emailing John Collison. It was somehow implied that applying that way was a more direct track than a cold email.

It's also stupid to pay for an ad in a "special" newsletter, mention how candidates can reach out to you, and:

1) Ignore the extra work done by someone to show high interest in the job

2) not even respond at all.

You might see things differently, of course. This is how I see it, and I think that Stripe didn't behave nicely in this particular stance. As stated at the beginning of my comment, this is not comparable to the OP story which, assuming it's completely true and unbiased, is certainly worse than mine.

replies(1): >>29399594 #
4. shrimpx ◴[01 Dec 21 01:26 UTC] No.29399594{3}[source]▶
Thanks for the extra context. Still, I would imagine that an employer would feel free to ghost any email or application from an unknown person unless it came with a specific recommendation from someone they know.
5. 3x3m3 ◴[01 Dec 21 10:07 UTC] No.29402355[source]▶
Thanks for sharing your story.

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.