Well intentioned company with great peers and growing pains - Anonymous employee Stripe Employee Review

I've been extremely impressed by Stripe since day 1 -- in how it composes itself facing difficult decisions, runs on the day-to-day, and goes above and beyond expectations on a consistent basis. Leadership is inspirational (listen to a podcast with Patrick) yet very grounded when the going gets tough. Our company values ("operating principles") are lived by the leaders and it does really trickle down through the reporting chain. I seldom find myself disagreeing with decisions leadership makes, and they are quite transparent about their reasoning why. Your peers are friendly, sometimes to a fault, and I don't notice much/any unhealthy competition in the engineering org. You can assume your peers are well-intentioned and are willing to hear you out fully, in the end doing what's best for the business (or, customer). A slight downside to this -- knowing the right people to talk to is an invaluable skill that isn't scaling so well as the company grows. The mission of the company -- grow the GDP of the internet -- is arguably pure and apolitical. There is a sense we are building core infrastructure for the world. It's nice not to feel conflicted about your work. I've been happy that our planning process is often long-term. You can successfully argue for ideas that might not result in immediate benefits, but will pay dividends in, say, a year. This applies to paying down tech debt to new products or features. Your argument has to be well articulated, though. Finally, as a medium sized company, there is so much work to be done and opportunity for those who are willing to go out and grab it (even if it's not always obvious). Ambition and foresight are recognized and rewarded, even if you don't necessarily have seniority or tenure.