“Revolut insiders reveal the human cost of a fintech unicorn’s wild rise”. “Revolut’s week from hell”. “Having a rough week? It could be worse, you could work at Revolut”. These are just some of the headlines of the last week, headlines of stories that are so unfair and far from the truth that I felt the need to present the other side of the table by sharing my experience as Revolut’s Country Manager in Romania and Project Manager of the European Growth Machine.

This is an inside view from an Eastern European pregnant woman that has been working for Revolut for the past 10 months and has no plans to leave the company any time soon. Before I begin, I just want to make myself clear: this article solely presents my personal experience as a Revolut employee and the things I went through over the past 10 months. It does not represent the view of Revolut and I am in no way speaking on behalf of the company. I am just sharing my experience and I am confident that hundreds of other employees will resonate with this and feel the same way.

Who am I?

Let’s start with a short introduction. I’m Irina Scarlat, an entrepreneur at heart, full-stack product marketer and experienced projects & people manager, with 10+ years of business experience, 7 of them in tech. I am Revolut’s Country Manager in Romania and I am proudly leading Revolut’s efforts to setup world-class growth teams in Europe and beyond, as Project Manager of what we call the “European Growth Machine”. I have been with Revolut for 10 months now and I am here to stay.

I have a fair share of experience in working with high-growth companies & tech startups. Before joining Revolut, I have been leading the marketing efforts of Uber in Romania, shaping the local strategy and working on strategic regional projects & initiatives. I also had a marketing agency working with tech startups and I am a global citizen that has lived, studied and worked in 7 cities across Europe and the United States. But enough about me — more information is publicly available on my LinkedIn profile, should you be interested in finding out more. I just wanted to provide some context into my background that could be useful later on in this story.

My Revolut journey

My story with Revolut starts back in January 2018, when I took the difficult decision to leave Uber after 2 amazing years spent there. I was determined to get back to entrepreneurship and pick-up my marketing agency where I left it, when I was approached by Andrius Biceika, then Revolut’s Head of Business Development.

We jumped on a call to further discuss collaboration opportunities, and, as a Revolut user, I was impressed by the company’s ambitions and drive. I decided to go forward in the interview process and, 1 home task and 3 interviews later, I got the offer to be Revolut’s Country Manager in Romania. I am always up for a challenge and growing the market 5x (from 20k to 100k users) in a couple of months, with no marketing budget, seemed just the type of problem I would have liked to solve. And so did I! For the record, today we have 180k Revolut users in Romania alone and still growing strong.

Said and done, I started working with Revolut in early May. I got to spend my first days in London for induction & onboarding, and it’s there where I got to meet plenty of talented and incredibly passionate people that were a true source of inspiration for me in the early days. I then got back to Romania, equipped with a comprehensive playbook with things I could do, and ready to start working on my KPIs (that were to get to 100k users by the end of the year).

I could have easily burned out by executing growth tactics during the weekdays and localising the app on nights and weekends. Instead, I chose to use my previous experience and market knowledge to focus on things that could actually move the needle for my market.

Luckily for me, I learnt the hard way in the past that lots of work does not equal results: it’s not about the hours you work, but the results you actually bring in those hours. So I chose to focus on impactful initiatives to drive user growth in my country, and I made sure to always work closely with the operations team in London and the support team in Krakow and create effective feedback loops.

I will not claim here that the work was easy or that I never worked weekends or some late nights. But when I did, it was a choice I made. I did it out of commitment and determination, out of the ambition to reach our goals, out of passion. And this is why lots of people within Revolut and outside, in the wider tech ecosystem, choose to work long hours. It’s a choice, not an obligation!

As for Revolut, never did my manager tell me to work nights or weekends. In fact, nobody actually cares when people work, nor for how long. What we all care about though are the results you get during your hours of work. One thing I love about Revolut is that we are not confined to the classical 9-to-5 (which I would never thrive in) and we have the flexibility to work when we want, from wherever we want, as long as we deliver high-quality work at pace.

Life outside work

As weird as it might sound after reading the stories I briefly mentioned in the beginning of my post, Revolut employees have life outside work as well, although work is an important part of our lives. Although I choose not to speak too often about this, I am happily married with a fantastic man and successful entrepreneur. And this is not a secret, but a choice of being discrete. I feel the need to talk about this now though.

One of our favourite ways of spending quality time together is travelling and discovering the world. Last year alone, we visited Cyprus, Lisbon, Porto, the Azores Island, and Istanbul in city-breaks or week-long trips with very limited internet connection. All these while working to grow my market and not feeling any FOMO or peer-pressure to work and be connected all the time. We also did a fair share of weekend escapes in Romania. I am now writing this story from the mountains, during a long weekend away, and the only pressure I feel in writing this now is the unfairness of the articles that I read on the go.

Back in October, 6 months after joining Revolut & 50k users later, I unexpectedly found out that I am pregnant, a news that filled me & my husband’s lives with joy. However, there was a cloud shading my happiness: the unfortunate experience that some other women in tech had when they got pregnant while having senior roles within their companies. Once they chose to have a child, most of them have been given less responsibilities, their roles were no longer what they used to be, and it seemed that they will have to make a step back for a while and pick-up what was left of their career after.

I tried to prepare my manager for the announcement which I made one week later, during our first face-to-face meeting. I was terrified. And I will never forget his genuine reaction: “OMG, congratulations, this is such good news! We will find a way to work things out, this is the last thing you should worry about. And by the way, you sounded so grim when preparing me that I thought you’d tell me you quit, not share such exciting news”. His reaction gave me the confidence I needed to keep delivering and made me even prouder to be working for Revolut.

Promotion & pregnancy

And the pleasant surprises with Revolut continued. Back in December, I started working closely with our VP of Operations, Alan Chang, brainstorming on the best structure for our global growth teams. We started working together trying to solve a problem: what is the best organisational structure that we should implement to speed our growth and what are the processes we should build to support this structure?

We had a fair share of Slack conversations, calls & meetings and, throughout this time, I really felt that my opinion is valued, that I am more than a number for Revolut and that I am a valued peer rather than a subordinate that has to deliver. And yes, I crossed a line several times due to the excitement I felt, and there were several instances where I pinged Alan at midnight or during weekends when I came up with a new idea or I read something that we could apply fast. I never felt pressured to answer outside of working hours — we were just a bunch of passionate people that were brainstorming and exchanging ideas, committed to get things done better, faster, more efficient!

I can’t even express in words the excitement I felt when Nik Storonsky, our CEO, approved the growth structure & framework we were working on. I found out this during a call I had with Alan in early January, and, not only that the framework has been approved, but he asked me whether I would like to lead the project we’ve been working on.

My first reaction was excitement, followed again by the same doubt and question: “Are you aware I am pregnant?”. And his answer gave me confidence and strength once again “Congratulations, this is fantastic! This does not change things in any way though: are you willing to take the lead here? Do you think you can handle additional responsibility?”. I happily accepted and, fast forward to today, I am currently leading Revolut’s efforts to setup a world-class growth team in Europe and beyond. Because Revolut is a company that supports people to lead big tasks and empowers them to get things done and I experienced this myself!

So how is it really like to work with Nik & Alan?

I like to believe that I am a correct person that speaks up and calls out BS out loud whenever it sees it. You might understand now why I felt the need to write this story, seeing how both Nik Storonsky, our CEO, and Alan Chang, our VP of Operations, are illustrated in the media stories of today. I am lucky to have worked with them directly for the past 2 months on building the European Growth Machine, and I feel it is so unfair to through away mud into effective managers & leaders based on old opinions of disgruntled former employees or of under-qualified applicants that never made it to our team.

Both Nik & Alan are very driven & passionate, their commitment is unparalleled and their door is always open. They have a lot of things on their plate and they are working all around the clock to get things done, so you might mistakenly misread them as cold. Indeed, they are very direct in approach and they are men of few words. But they are reasonable in both demands and expectations, they are very fair and they are there for you to help you out with everything you need.

To give you a couple of examples. I used to have daily standups with Alan in the beginning of the project and he was always asking me what do I need to drive things forward. How can he help me out? And there were several times when I pushed back on deadlines because they were too tight and unrealistic, given my schedule. He always understood, never pushed back, never bullied.

In the beginning, I was afraid every time I had to talk to Nik via Slack or calls. I mean, I guess everyone can feel this way: I am an Eastern European pregnant woman with a senior role within the company he built from scratch. After the first conversations we had, I understood how unjustified this fear was. Besides the drive and eagerness to help, Nik always answered when I pinged him. He was always there to help. He showed me that he valued my opinion and encouraged me to express it by constantly asking me during calls what’s my take on the issues discussed. And he encouraged me to disagree and speak out loud, given my growth & product marketing background. I feel grateful & lucky to be working with him.

So, are they perfect? Oh, no, they are not, but none of us is. They could be better managers and they did a fair share of mistakes in the past. And so did each and every one of us, if we are to be completely honest. But their commitment to improve, the fact they are always there fighting for their people, their drive and determination mean the world to me. And for hundreds other of Revolut employees as well.

Revolut’s culture

Recent stories in the media portray a Revolut culture that is toxic, hostile and stressful. All these based on talks with disgruntled former employees or underqualified applicants that never got the chance to work with the company. All these more than 1 year old. All written by aggressive journalists that are thirsty for blood and that are harassing people in the company (both existing & former employees, people in my team), asking them to give off-the-record statements about the toxicity of our culture. And this is not fair! Not fair for Nik & Vlad, our Co-Founders, who worked a ton and sacrificed a lot to build the Revolut of today. Not fair for Alan, who is working tirelessly to build an effective Ops machine. Not fair for us, the hundreds of happy employees all around Europe who are proud to be working for Revolut.

The question that still remains though is how is working for Revolut really like and what is the Revolut culture. So here is my take on this (again, with the mention that this is no way the view of the company, but my own):

Revolut moves fast and avoids breaking things!

We are innovating in a highly competitive environment and disrupting the banking industry as we know it. We are growing incredibly fast and this comes along with plenty of growing pains. We have to move fast to succeed and sometimes it might feel like you are walking on a wire at 100m above ground. There is a very fine-balance between tactical & strategic initiatives, and you do have to find that balance for yourself, while always keeping your eyes on the prize.

If you think you know what fast-paced means and you never worked in a high-growth company, think twice! Revolut is for the people that move fast (without breaking important things) and are able to find the line between tactic & strategic, always having the overall objectives in mind.

2. Revolut is about getting **IT done!

We are doers and builders, passionate about Revolut and our mission! People that succeed at Revolut are entrepreneurs at heart, focused on getting results. I told it above and I will tell it one more time here: nobody cares how many hours you actually work, but what are the results you actually deliver in those hours. And here it comes down to the seniority of the people and their capacity of being productive and effective when it comes to their work.

3. Revolut is for the ones that never settle

Revolut is for people that don’t take no for an answer. It is for the ones that never settle! We are really passionate about what we do and hence for us it is pretty ordinary to wake up early in the morning or stay late at night to find out solutions. We are doing it out of passion, not out of obligation!

4. Revolut is for problem solvers & truth seekers

There are plenty of problems to solve out there and we are aiming to find solutions to those! This is not an easy task, but we are ambitious and driven. We are seeking out truth in data, working together to find the best solutions to the problems our users have. Revolut is not for the people that complain about problems. It is for the ones that are taking any problem as an opportunity!

5. Revolut is for the ones that are resilient through change

Last, but not least, we are working in an incredibly fast-paced environment and this comes with a lot of change. We went from 0 to 4M users in less than 4 years. We went from 2 people to over 800. A lot has changed. A lot is about to change. We are together through this, but we have to bear in mind that people that succeed at Revolut are the ones that are resilient through change and have the capacity to adapt to an ever-changing environment.

A very simple conclusion

Working for Revolut is not right for everyone, as is the case with any high-growth company out there, particularly in tech. Working for Revolut is not easy. Working for Revolut is the right choice for me and for my colleagues. But it might not be the right choice for you, and this is perfectly ok! Each of us is fit in a specific environment and we should make an informed choice to be where we thrive and are happy, preferably without trying to judge and discuss cultures where we do not fit or those that we have no clue about!