Nikhil Kansal: How I Became a Software Engineer at Stripe

Ever since he was ten years old, Nikhil Kansal knew that he wanted to work in the tech industry.

“I remember I got this picture book at the library on how to build a website and I would have fun changing the background colors and fonts on stuff. It was a creative outlet for me.”

Now, he is a software engineer at Stripe, one of the most valuable private fintech companies in the United States. So, how did he get there?

Kansal studied computer science at the University of California, Los Angeles, and took part in multiple tech-oriented student organizations, such as the Association for Computing Machinery. By getting involved on campus, Kansal was able to learn from his peers while gaining priceless experiences organizing workshops, having fun at community bonding events, and entering hackathons.

“These activities aren’t necessary, but the thing that’s tough about computer science is doing it alone. The main thing you want to look for is a community of supportive people, and clubs are a great way to meet like minded people and get exposure to topics you never knew existed.”

Throughout his college career, Kansal also gained work experience interning at companies such as Bauer Consulting, Cisco, and Quora. However, his most gratifying experience was founding his first startup with a classmate.

In his third year of college, Kansal and his friend Vic Yeh founded Aurora, an application programming interface and analytics platform for adding voice capability using AI, like Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant. Kansal and Yeh wanted to create a VUI and share it with smaller developers and companies that weren’t Amazon and Google, so that everyone could have access and integrate it into their own products. They believed that voice was the next frontier and could change the way we live our lives, similar to the revolution of touchscreen technology.

However, after getting into a startup accelerator and working on the code for a year and a half, Kansal and Yeh folded the project.

“Ultimately the idea was good, but it was hard to find the customers who would pay for it because voice as an enterprise is a field in which all of the players know each other. For instance, if I wanted Samsung to use my tech, I need to know someone at Samsung who’s willing to take a chance on my product. That’s why it’s so important to have connections and familiarity in the industry you want to disrupt.”

Despite that, the startup experience taught Kansal how to better approach problems as an engineer, specifically, taking a goal-oriented approach.

“The thing that was really interesting about founding a startup was getting to define the problem I wanted to solve, and validating the route I was taking to actually solving that problem. I wanted to make sure the thing I was building was actually helping people”

By strengthening his studies at UCLA with real-world experiences, Kansal was able to build on his hard skills and gain a better understanding of the industry.

Stripe is a software platform that allows businesses of all sizes, from new startups to large corporations, to accept online payments, start corporate credit cards and take out small loans. Founded in 2010, Stripe is now valued at $35 billion, and continues to expand everyday.

Kansal first joined Stripe as a software engineering intern in 2018, and immediately knew that this was his career. After his internship ended, he accepted a full time offer, and is now six months into his new job. For Kansal, Stripe’s growing momentum means its own set of exciting opportunities where he gets to both watch and contribute to the company’s future.

“Stripe is in a place where it’s really starting to deal with issues of scale, which means examining our current internal systems and figuring out how best to allow the company to grow at its current, rapid pace.”

While billion dollar corporations such as Facebook have already solved these problems, Stripe is working to solve them now, meaning engineers like Kansal are able to play a part in how the company tackles these obstacles. In fact, Kansal’s favorite aspect of working at Stripe is how anyone at the company is able to present their ideas.

“They really value ideas over seniority, meaning every person on any team has the opportunity to contribute in a meaningful way.”

Stripe does this through their asynchronous style of company communication. Instead of holding company or team-wide meetings, the company primarily shares and disseminates information through documents.

For instance, upper management may share a document describing problem ‘X.’ The document is shared across the company, and anyone with an idea on how to solve it can write a document with their idea and share it with the team(s) involved. Anyone can comment, critique, or show support for the idea on the doc, making participation easy and efficient.

“It doesn't matter who is writing the idea as long as the document has merit.”

This means that although Kansal works in the Foundations subpillar -- the part of the company responsible for how data is stored, how networking is set up, how code is deployed, and what security practices Stripe is following -- he gets to also contribute to broader problems Stripe wants to solve.

“Management does a really good job in that if you don't feel like you’re growing, they give you the opportunities to grow. I’ve already felt myself grow over the six months that I’ve been working here, and I’m really excited about what’s next.”

After spending the past four years working in tech, Kansal has three pieces of advice for students looking to break into the industry themselves.

1. Spend one summer doing an internship

In order to know if the tech industry is really for you, Kansal advises students to experience the work for themselves.

“Doing an internship will give you a really good idea if the tech industry is for you because they’re more or less similar in experience to working at a company full time.”

Since actual work experience is one of the most vital ways for someone to find their true career path, students should take advantage of the variety of tech internships out there to get a better understanding of what’s right for them. Even if it’s not for a large company like Google, any internship offers a priceless chance for learning and advancement.

2. Put yourself out there

Kansal advises students to go to as many recruiting events out there, and send out your resume everywhere.

“Even if it takes 200 cold emails, don't be afraid to do it because everyone is in the same situation.”

For students or newly grads afraid to step into the tech field, Kansal ensures that these feelings are not reality, and students shouldn’t let their insecurities get the better of them.

“I think that everyone feels imposter syndrome at least at one point, but think of it as a waddling duck. When you look at a duck swimming on a lake. It might look calm and collected, just gliding along, but under the lake, the duck is paddling very frantically. At the end of the day, everyone is just trying their best.”

With a new informal study showing that 58% of tech employees from companies such as Facebook, Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft suffer from imposter syndrome, Kansal’s words are crucial for anyone feeling overwhelmed by the industry.

3. Get to know people in the industry

Kansal explains how students should really spend time getting to know everyone in the industry, not just recruiters. Due to the competitive and goal-oriented nature of tech, Kansal finds that being a humble, genuine person is a quality that stands out in tech, and compassion can go a long way.

Ultimately, the rapid development in tech offers numerous, diverse career opportunities for anyone interested in the industry, and Kansal believes that tech can lead to some of the most fulfilling careers.

“Tech has a problem-solving aspect that’s not as present in non-tech industries because their problems are less open-ended. There are so many possibilities, and I’ve still got a lot of exploration to do.”

You can find Nikhil Kansal here.