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I left Stripe a little over 6 months ago to join an exciting startup with a number of my friends. What I miss most about working there is the culture of shippin
by spudlyo 8y ago
I left Stripe a little over 6 months ago to join an exciting startup with a number of my friends. What I miss most about working there is the culture of shipping. There are a number of 'shipped' email lists at Stripe where people can tout their accomplishments large and small. These lists are widely read and commented on, and folks put in a fair amount of effort making their "shipped" emails informative and entertaining.
That feeling you get when you finish a challenging project, write a great shipped email, and get a bunch of feedback from folks throughout the company is pretty amazing. Once I was invited to convert one of my shipped emails into a presentation for a company all-hands meeting. I had a less than a week to get it done, which was pretty hectic, but in the end it turned out great and it was perhaps my favorite memory of my time at Stripe.
I enjoy my current job, and those little dopamine hits I get from checking things off my list as well as the bigger ones from finishing projects, but now only my boss and some teammates notice when I finish something. One thing I learned about myself, is that I really do care about what other people think about my work.
- singhrac 8y agoI really enjoyed that aspect too. I was an intern a few years ago, and at the end of my internship I sent out a 'shipped' email, with lots of positive feedback. It's easy to feel ignored as an intern, but Stripe at the time felt very cohesive. In reply to foldr's comment, yes, they were totally optional (I can't imagine it's changed).
- CharlesW 8y ago> These lists are widely read and commented on, and folks put in a fair amount of effort making their "shipped" emails informative and entertaining. Neat! I understand that you can't share them, but do you happen to know of any public examples?
- yingw787 8y agoI agree that release notes and credits are really important. My prior company's product manager made these herself for every release, and while other parts of the company weren't great, I (and others) really liked getting the recognition from the rest of the company. It helps make a fuller product, since people have less pressure to always work on the flashier things, and can devote time/energy to things like developer tools that are also extremely important.
- byyw13 8y agoif you're at startup, you should feel the control to establish the culture you'd like to have. I'd say, introduce the emails, let the feedback be known. I think you have more control on your experience than you might think
- foldr 8y agoIs this optional? I would personally have no interest in writing such emails - it's just more work.
- jwagenet 8y agoPresumably it's just a forum for validation. If sharing your success with your peers doesn't get you off you can forgo the email, but you might lose some exposure.
- foldr 8y agoYeah, that's what I mean. It feels like it's just forcing everyone to increase the amount of time they spend on self-promotion (even if it's theoretically "optional").
- chasely 8y agoNot ever seeing these emails, it depends on where you stand. I can see how it would benefit the organization to have people know what is being shipped in other areas of the org, and also provide valuable feedback loops from differing perspectives. However if all the threads are just “great job on X!” I can see how that could be low-value self promotion.
- ultrasaurus 8y agoI can't speak to Stripe, but I expect that this is something that Engineers CAN do, but Product Managers MUST do. Letting the rest of the org know what's going on is a big part of the challenge in scaling a company.
- foldr 8y agoIt doesn't seem like these emails are merely notifications of what's going on (which obviously no-one could object to).
- 8y ago
- hnaccy 8y agoSounds annoying, never liked tooting my own horn.
- Angostura 8y agoDon;t think of it as tooting your own horn, think of it as a useful description of something that has been developed, that co-workers could helpfully know about.
- JohnJamesRambo 8y agoI'm honestly at a loss about what innovation Stripe really needs to do or what would make working there rewarding. They are a credit card payment processor, hasn't all the kinks been worked out of that by now? I guess the fraud prevention aspect would be mildly entertaining, but I can see how the company would need these "shipped" emails and the middle management masturbation/social ladder performance review/Strategy Memo(TM) games to keep people from being horribly bored.
- Operyl 8y agoFar from it, as the article points out. There’s a lot of weird, unknown failure points. And there’s always room for innovation in all industries.
- cyberferret 8y agoIf Stripe's HR department is reading this thread, I think they can pinpoint one crucial interview question that will determine culture fit in their organisation for future hiring - and that is "do you like talking about your accomplishments with the rest of your team?". Seems to be a very polarising thing to be asked to do, judging by the replies on this particular comment. EDIT: Curious about the downvotes? This is a real thing. I am sure they don't want to hire people that would hate to write shipped emails and publish them to the list if they actively hated writing them. It is simply not good culture fit, and I am sure they would want to identify that early on in the recruitment process.
- andrewingram 8y agoPossibly that such a recruitment filter would exclude a lot of people with depression or anxiety-related mental illness. To clarify, I hate talking about my accomplishments, it makes me feel deeply anxious and uncomfortable, and will say as much if asked. But I’ll also do it if that’s what’s required of me.
- jodrellblank 8y ago.. so you're saying it would be an effective filter, for the suggested purpose?
- jacques_chester 8y agoAt work (Pivotal) there's a "Drumbeats" mailing list which I subscribe to. Various teams post there to describe what they're doing. The company has grown so much larger since I joined that I have found the Drumbeats to be a godsend. It helps me feel connected to the breadth of what's going on, which would be physically impossible otherwise. I guess a time will come when there are too many Drumbeat emails to keep up with (it sometimes feels that way -- I've gotten better at skimming). I don't know what I'll do then. We also have a What We Learned This Week list. It's gone a bit quiet lately, which is a shame, because there were some amazing war stories posted.
- mistidoi 8y agoJust curious... What does engineering management look like at Stripe? Do they do the standard goal-setting stuff that's common in the valley?