Get to know
TRANSFERWISE
WHAT TRANSFERWISE DOES
Transferwise allows users to transfer money abroad at a rate that is up to 8 times cheaper than a transaction made through a bank. As crazy as that sounds, it’s because your bank actually sets its own exchange rate which is higher than the mid-exchange rate — the fairest exchange rate. The big question is “How?” TransferWise has bank accounts in all its operating countries. If a user wanted to transfer USD $1000 to the UK, they transfer that amount to TransferWise’s US bank account, after which the company would convert it at the exchange rate shown on Google, Yahoo and XE, and transfer the resulting amount to the recipient in UK from its UK bank account. Currently, Transferwise has offices in 10 locations across the globe: Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Sydney, Tokyo, Budapest, Tampa, Cherkasy, New York, Tallinn and London.
TransferWise is growing. Click here to see the jobs page!
WHY WORK AT TRANSFERWISE?
Transferwise doesn’t have a top-down management like most other companies. Instead, they have more than 50 autonomous teams across UK, Estonia, US, Hungary, Ukraine, Japan, Australia, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur. What do we mean by autonomous? All teams are authorised to make product decisions and execute them by themselves, so there’s no single decision-making power, and thus, no bottlenecks either. Sounds chaotic, but everyone is guided by customer needs, as well as the company’s mission statement that money transfer should be convenient, transparent, instant and eventually free, and everyone makes decisions based on these guiding principles. However, this also means that the company has to be on top of their communication game. Hence, teams across the different countries have bi-weekly meetings, despite the vastly different time zones, to make sure every team stays updated on the product’s status, and to avoid any one team going rogue. To add to the bi-weekly meeting, employees also have to travel to the different country offices to meet with their functional team members. According to their HR Project Lead, Rachel, it’s a must for all new hires to fly to the Tallinn office in Estonia for at least a week. “So they really get to absorb the DNA of Transferwise.” Employees also have lots of opportunities to mingle amongst themselves — the Singapore team has Fika every Thursday, where they have tea and pastries, sometimes someone even bakes, and everyone talks about anything except work. Sounds amazing, doesn't it? The bad news: They aren’t hiring interns as of now. “Currently, we don’t feel like we can provide the support that interns will need.” But for all who are interested in full-time positions at Transferwise's Singapore office, here’s a tip — show your interest by asking great questions during the interview. As for what questions to ask, we’ll leave that to you to figure it out.
