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Brex Layoffs
- Ancalagon 3y agoKind of saw that coming. The salaries at Brex were insane.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- H8crilA 3y agoHigher than FAANG? Or whatever is the acronym today.
- Ancalagon 3y agoAt some point (not sure if this is still the case) you could choose between all salary or a mix of salary and options. The total comp in either case was ~450k for a senior dev. So we are talking Netflix-level salaries for a startup.
- onlyrealcuzzo 3y agoHigher than MSFT for sure - but not Netflix or Google: https://www.levels.fyi/companies/brex/salaries/software-engineer?country=254 https://www.levels.fyi/companies/brex/salaries/software-engi...
- fuddle 3y ago$263.42K for an entry level position, wow.
- onlyrealcuzzo 3y agoIf you look, entry level is >10% more than the next level, so it's probably off - but likely about $200k or more. Pretty great for a Non-FAANG company.
- goalonetwo 3y agoFAANG is not the top of the market at all anymore. Google pays middle market unless you have a competing offer.
- myth_drannon 3y agoTo be fair, everyone is laying off. Whatever paid peanuts or millions. Hopefully, the devs who got the bigger piece of the cake stashed some under the mattress.
- Ancalagon 3y ago20% after an 11% layoff is high even during current times imo
- dpflan 3y agoCash salary or made up stock options valuations?
- ashconnor 3y agoBrexit?
- GiorgioG 3y ago> To continue capturing the massive opportunity ahead, we’re hyper-focused on building a high-velocity product and growth machine. I mean, who wouldn't want to work for this guy?
- wiremine 3y agoCame here to say the same thing. The lack of plain English is funny if it wasn't such a sad situation. I also know it's nothing new or unique.
- masto 3y agoHe's clearly operating at all levels. As an aside, it's funny (not ha-ha funny) watching these things sweep through in waves; they're basically fashion. For a while, we needed to "put the structure in place to be able to scale" and it was all about adding more levels of hierarchy. Now we're flattening the org chart and managers are expected to do everyone's job at once. Today everyone needs to own the product vision. Tomorrow you need to focus on execution and stop stepping on product management's toes. Be more hands-on. Now stop micromanaging. We're Agile. We can't keep changing the plan. Promote from within; the best leaders start in the trenches. We need professionals with outside perspective, so we're filling that role with some guy from Oracle.
- blitzar 3y agoThey are clearly in the arena trying things.
- hmsp 3y ago"high velocity"
- kolanos 3y agoTerminal Velocity
- cowthulhu 3y agoInteresting that the CFO and CTO also got the boot, but the positions weren’t eliminated. Is this a power grab? Or am I misreading?
- Jemaclus 3y agoIt's not clear to me how you would have a company of this size without a CTO or CFO. I'm interested in why your expectation is that the roles themselves would be eliminated, versus bringing in people who might perform better?
- hiatus 3y agoFTA: > We’re flattening our org structure and reducing layers of management. Our goal is for leaders to operate closer to the metal, less siloed and more functionally, focused on few cross-company priorities. These changes begin with the leadership team and cascade across the org:
- nkingsy 3y agoCOO and CTO
- gamblor956 3y agoThe CFO position is generally mandated by law in most states, though it can be filled by another officer such as the CEO (i.e., it doesn't need to be its own position). However, it is generally considered a red flag for a large company to have these positions filled by the same individual (unless the company is a subsidiary of an even bigger company, in which case the CFO role in the subsidiary may be a pro forma position).
- hiatus 3y ago> The CFO position is generally mandated by law in most states, though it can be filled by another officer such as the CEO (i.e., it doesn't need to be its own position). Only two states seem to mandate a CFO from https://www.harborcompliance.com/corporate-governance-by-state https://www.harborcompliance.com/corporate-governance-by-sta...
- Gabrys1 3y agoI like that they shared publicly the severance package (I missed that in a company before, the severance package was only available to the ones laid off, and you wouldn't even know if you got the same as your colleagues). And the package itself seems alright too (and sensible, for example: the laid off can keep their laptops. What would company do with almost 300 extra laptops?). Time of the lay off also not too bad (firing people in November/December is really uncool). All in all, not TOO bad from what I can see in the public post. Oh, and they also said how many people first, not how many percent, which suggest they think about their human resources as actual individuals.
- sokoloff 3y agoI've been on both sides of the layoff discussions all too many times over the years. Even at the most disorganized or chaotic places, I've never seen the severance packages be anything other than a set formula. That formula might consider location, level, tenure, and other relevant factors, but I don't think I've ever seen a case where it was "I like Alice more than Bob, so Alice gets more..."
- mrsilencedogood 3y agoThe laptop thing is usually less about clawing back property and more about preventing the laptop, potentially with customer PII and source code and other stuff on it, ending up sold on ebay or left laying around as a personal device to be eventually lost at an airport 3 years later, and so on. They take them back, wipe them, then either resell them to a reseller or reissue them to other employees etc.
- toomuchtodo 3y agoIndeed, the financial services firm I contribute at is required to remotely lock and wipe laptops when offboarding for compliance purposes, and that is somewhat consistent with the other FIs I’ve seen the inside of. How effective this is depends on an org's MDM story (people, process, controls).
- jupp0r 3y agoIf they are managed devices (which I hope they are at a fintech company), it should be trivial to remote wipe them before removing MDM from them to enable personal use/resale etc.
- latchkey 3y agoPreviously: Brex, valued at $12.3B earlier this year, lays off 11% of staff https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33167302 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33167302 (October 11, 2022 — 14 points, 1 comments)
- mrnobody_67 3y agoCompany was burning $17m per month with less than $300m in revenue... while growing at a slower rate than ramp.com . simply unsustainable.
- mise_en_place 3y agoIt's really disappointing to see the trajectory that Brex is on. I was extremely enthusiastic about their product, they had the best business banking/credit/expense tracking in the industry. I was a very happy customer, until they decided they would only chase SV startup unicorns as their customers, and terminated my account. Brex is very much a cautionary tale for other startups.
- yesimahuman 3y agoThey lied (or did not clearly inform their sales people) about their AWS credit promotion a few years ago which really annoyed me when they were trying to sell us. Went back to the safe embrace of SVB but I guess that didn't really play out well. As a startup I desperately want to see more credit card companies willing to offer cards to founders without ridiculous personal guarantees, so I hope they figure it out.
- mise_en_place 3y agoI have used SVB in the past as well, for my first startup. They were solidly OK. This is still an area ripe for disruption IMO, old Brex filled the niche but for some reason we just can't do payments and banking correctly in the US. India has UPI for instance, and even foreigners can avail themselves of this facility.
- tedivm 3y agoSolidly okay right up to their bank run.
- ensignavenger 3y agoAs an SVB customer, how bad was it? Did you have any delays or other issues accessing your money? Did service or perks change a lot after the takeover?
- yesimahuman 3y agoThey let us get our cash out within a few days IIRC, and we switched to a different bank (was right after we were acquired so kind of a different situation). I would say there's still a large gap in the market SVB filled but I am not using them for my new company yet so can't compare before/after.
- gr1zzlybe4r 3y agoI wonder what the revenue of their customers looks like. They have to have a ton of revenue from other startups that themselves are in tenuous financial positions. From the employee's perspective, it definitely sucks though. I went through a layoff this year and it took me a lot longer than I anticipated to get another job.
- frfl 3y ago> increasing in-person collaboration in our hubs, and concentrating the time zones in which we operate. > With our focus on financial software and high-quality growth, we grew gross profit by 75%+ last year. While we're proud of those accomplishments, we still have a way to go to ensure high-velocity growth and profitability for years to come
- e1g 3y ago> increasing in-person collaboration in our hubs, and concentrating the time zones in which we operate Massive turn-around since Brex declared themselves to be remote-first and said things like "Yes, employees can relocate permanently with Brex’s transition to remote-first" https://www.brex.com/journal/remote-first-at-brex https://www.brex.com/journal/remote-first-at-brex
- bagels 3y agoEmployees had leverage. Now they do not.
- gamblor956 3y agoIf true, this is a good sign for the future of the company, as it means that their revenue metrics are fine. The problem is that they are simply spending too much on activities not related to the business. For tech companies, that usually means spending too much money on "tech" that isn't actually relevant to the revenue-generating business, especially now that the section 174 changes have eliminated the preferential treatment of software R&D.
- claudiulodro 3y agoIt seems like companies are really tightening the screws further this year. When I got into this industry I figured the good times would roll for about 10 years, and then it would be about time for another career change. "Make hay while the sun is shining", as they say. I'm right around that 10th year, and I think that prediction was accurate.
- soneca 3y agoDo you think there is a career out there better than (I assume) software development? My view is that we are still in pretty good times. Maybe not great, but everyone who kept their jobs is still earning a big salary. And everything else other than software development is worse (specifically if you bundle things like ML into “software development“). I am curious. What career would you change to?
- toomuchtodo 3y agoAttorney. Build a system, work from anywhere, make your own schedule. Hard to outsource.
- atlasunshrugged 3y agoReally? I would have assumed that attorney is one of those jobs that is going to be hugely disrupted by AI. Should people new to the field bother if they aren't going to be top X% (5? 10?)?
- cpursley 3y agoThere's way more to legal work than filling out forms. The AI is going to replace legal assistants, not the attorneys themselves.
- abc03 3y agoFor people without the resources, yes. For people that have a problem and resources, no. They pay for the best and want to be sure it‘s watertight.
- yourstruly-br 3y agoThere was no lack of funding for Henrique’s posh wedding ceremony in a paradise island in Brazil back in October though. https://www.metropoles.com/colunas/fabia-oliveira/video-veja-a-decoracao-do-casamento-que-parou-fernando-de-noronha/amp https://www.metropoles.com/colunas/fabia-oliveira/video-veja...
- leosanchez 3y agoGetting 403
- blitzar 3y agoThe founders are never part of the layoffs.
- syspec 3y agoHonestly looks like a slightly above average wedding - prob cheaper than getting married in the US
- mista2nith 3y agoWhy do people post stuff like this? A guy made some money and had a nice wedding. Would you prefer he kill himself?
- jchonphoenix 3y ago20% of the company Given how it sounds like Brex is doing, they're likely going to need to cut again. This isn't deep enough to really solve any systemic or structural problems. It will likely work though if the product vision and execution are on point and they just need more runway/less bloat.
- jamestimmins 3y agoBut do layoffs ever solve systemic or structural problems? They're typically about reducing burn. Whether management knows how to identify and fix core problems is a totally different question.
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago> But do layoffs ever solve systemic or structural problems? Brex is a leveraged play on start-up fundraising. They're a fundamentally cyclical business.
- jchonphoenix 3y agoI have seen them do so in the past. But they need to be very targeted similar to surgery. There's some tumor in the company and you need to identify what that is and remove all of it. I've seen it effectively done once.
- shmatt 3y agoOof to this link in the post https://www.brex.com/journal/operate-at-all-levels https://www.brex.com/journal/operate-at-all-levels What a terrible culture, dunking on people management, calling it meaningless And no, I don't want the Director of AI to explain react component rendering to me, it sounds like they are grooming a generation of super-micromanaging executives. Maybe the CTO was kicked out after he failed to complete 3 back to back leetcode hards
- bsilvereagle 3y ago> it sounds like they are grooming a generation of super-micromanaging executives My read from the linked example was the Director built a tool outside of the critical path that was a quality of life (performance) improvement. This is a prime example of code that leaders should be writing - the team isn’t blocked by them, they can put it down at any time, they maintain familiarity with the tools and codebase (both the good and the bad), and if it lands then the team is uplifted.
- shmatt 3y agoA leader should know how to influence his org within a 3 minute conversation to do this. The fact he stopped his Director of AI work to do this means their org is broken - or worse they have no influence over it
- encoderer 3y agoDisagree. this is a founder pushing back against having a leadership caste that can’t actually do the work to drive the business forward themselves.
- nurettin 3y agoThis is not even cynicism, it's just grasping at straws.
- homefree 3y agoIt depends - I mostly agree with that blog post. If a leader doesn't understand the underlying role (at least somewhat) - they can't reason about it. The best people managers I had were good at that skill and took it seriously, but also had a technical understanding of the role. I think it's relatively common for bad people to get hired to these management roles because the skill can be harder to evaluate than straight engineering. Hire enough of this kind of person and your company dies. It's also why managers get a bad reputation generally - good managers/team leads are excellent, bad ones are neutral at best.
- ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago"Today we’re restructuring Brex to become a high-velocity company" Lol. Wtf were you doing so long as a CEO? I never understood these dumb messages.
- geodel 3y agoLeveraging synergies to provide accelerated experience in rapidly changing customer marketplace to become thoughtiest of all thought leaders...blah..blah..
- ilrwbwrkhv 3y agoI know right. It is such a mind boggling thing that all of the "free speech" tech aficionados speak in the highest form of nonsensical group think.
- kissgyorgy 3y agoIt's insane how much bullshit is on their home page. Can someone explain what the hell are "smart spending" and "integrated cards"?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- sam0x17 3y agoI guess this is what happens 1.5 years later when you decide to kick all LLCs off from using your platform and they all go to use your competitors instead
- spandrew 3y ago"Henrique and I are responsible for the decisions that led us here, and seeing so many talented folks go through this experience is never what you hope for as a founder." ~ Responsible but not accountable, got it.
- tschellenbach 3y agoLikely not the last round. From their numbers, it seems pretty clear that they need to become profitable.
- vegancap 3y agoTone of this is just awful, reads like he's saying they've laid off a bunch of people who were slowing us down, and sort of ends it by saying how excited he is about the business now they've been let go...
- sam0x17 3y agoThat's venture capital for you..
- JCharante 3y ago> Waiver of the one-year equity cliff for those who haven’t reached theirs yet. That's nice, however I find it "unfair" that if you are offered X RSUs as part of your first year comp but they vest over 4 years then if you get laid off you lose them even if you already "worked" for them. My experience losing 40k worth of RSUs at my first job has certainly soured equity compensation in my eyes.
- twojobsoneboss 3y ago[dead]
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- Yhippa 3y agoSo strange putting this out in public. It's almost like it was entirely written to investors.
- yalogin 3y agoHow bad is the job market for tech folks now? Are companies hiring at all ?
- frfl 3y agoMy response will just be one data point, so take it with a grain of salt and do your own research. Job applications to interview rates are _way_ down, like 5% or less. Some job posts will likely feel like you sent your job application into a black hole and it will never be seen by anyone or get any response at all. I'd imagine use of "AI" job application screening services have greatly increased and HR departments are likely screening application even harder than before. Most jobs posted are senior/staff level only, rarely do you see a non-senior posting. But still you might see an non-senior job posted here and there. People I know did find jobs after layoffs in 2023, but rather than in weeks it was months and likely, but I'm not 100% certain, for lower pay (all people I know where in different countries, but working for US companies). Other companies have hiring freezes and some seem to (almost) not have hired at all in 2023. One trend I've noticed is job postings by US companies in South America (Brazil for eg.), Mexico, Eastern Europe, India are _way_ up. Interpret that as you will. Venture funds are likely scaling their investments into companies back, especially non-AI companies, so venture funded companies that were in growth month either tried their best to cut costs (no hiring, layoffs) and shift to profit/revenue mode or shut down. Publicly traded companies seem to have shifted to increasing their share prices using similar tactics. So, currently bleak, compared to pre-covid to 2021, but might be possible to still find something with a lot of persistence. Not an ideal situation for anyone looking currently, unless you have some special connections or are skilled in AI work etc.
- twojobsoneboss 3y ago[dead]
- DecentRecruiter 3y agoAs a tech recruiter, I can say that you 100% nailed it. Thank you for explaining it so well.
- starkparker 3y agoThe people at the bottom get laid off and the people at the top get promoted. Makes sense
- Ancalagon 3y agoIts board members vs everyone else
- rishab1 3y agoSo sorry to hear dear friends
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]