Ellevest

Our Company

We’re a well-funded, early-stage tech startup based in NYC that is reinventing financial services for women. We’re currently in stealth mode building a new kind of investment platform, which has the potential to be a disruptive and meaningful force for good. Our team has deep, successful roots in the startup and finance communities. We’re a mission-driven company with a diverse team of people who value honest and transparent communication, simple and focused execution, and work life balance. We’re building a NYC-based team and offer market compensation and significant equity for world-class candidates.

The Engineering Interview Process

The engineers we’re currently hiring are important roles for the launch of our company, our product and ongoing growth. To make sure that we’re finding people who can help us develop the best culture, top of the line engineering processes and a great team dynamic, we try to get to know people really well during the hiring process.

We usually start out with a casual meeting at a coffee or tea spot nearby. This gives both of us an opportunity to have a “normal” conversation. Our hope is that this is a way for both of us to answer the question: Can I relate to this person as a coworker, mentor, manager, etc? We’ll also talk a bit about the type of role you’re interested in and what we’re looking for.

If that first conversation seemed good for both of us, we then aim to setup a meeting here in the office. This one is a bit longer and a bit more about Ellevest specifically. This is an opportunity for us to share with you a bit about how our systems work on a very high level, as well as about how our team and company are setup. We’re hoping at this point that you’re developing a sense of what it would be like for you to work at Ellevest, and where you could see yourself fitting.

The last step is a coding challenge. Now, we’re not a huge fan of coding challenges, but we also feel like we need a way to truly “get” working with you. So, generally we’ll ask you to spend an hour or so pair programming with a team member working in a codebase on a new feature. For junior positions, we may just give you a take home exercise to do in your spare time. For senior positions, we’ll probably ask you to do some whiteboard architecting, too. Ultimately, this session is about understanding you, the way you work, and what it would be like working with you, not about us proving we’re smarter than you or that you check a very specific checkbox.

From there it takes us a day or two to speak with your references. References are an important step of the process for us; we learn about your work history and also learn how we can best can work well with you. Once that is done, we try to have a formal offer with market compensation and equity within a day or two.