My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon • Hacker News Board

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#291

Post by bsder » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:20 PM UTC

curiousfiddler wrote: post #35

I'm quite surprised that of all the famous Silicon Valley people, and their rallying behind Jeff Bezos, no one seems to believe that some part of these many many stories could be true. Either that, or they seem to think that only incompetent people are complaining. Therefore I must post part of my comment I posted here [1]. One of my good friend, who was suffering at Amazon, is thriving at Google. He's done amazingly…

> I'm quite surprised that of all the famous Silicon Valley people, and their rallying behind Jeff Bezos

Because this isn't news to anybody.

I've known that working for Amazon sucks since 2005? And I'm not even in software. I presume software professionals have known longer than that. That's how bad Amazon's reputation is.

What new is that it's getting press outside of Silly Valley.

Thus, the rallying. Just about every Silicon Valley company will come in for a shellacking once people actually start looking at them.

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#292

Post by exodust » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:22 PM UTC

"Needed therapy" is such a click-baity deliberate inflation of drama before we even get to the story. That alone caused me to look for a counter-argument, from someone who worked there, not their wife, or colleague, but an actual employee.

(warning, no drama, no neglected infants, no angry wives)

https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/201x/2015/08/16/Working-a...

And btw, the claim that Amazon "encourages employees to tear apart one another's ideas" is also dramatic. Actually, I've seen the opposite happen where nobody says anything "nasty" about anyone's ideas for fear of deviating from the "positive work culture". Bad ideas can go a long way before they're spotted if you're not willing to speak up.

Tearing shreds sounds to me like an opportunity to cut through the bullshit. It doesn't need to be personal, the mission is bigger than the individual. Ego should be put aside. Maybe I should try working at Amazon.

A manager at my former workplace from years ago, let's call it News Corp, said to the technical team of 30 in a meeting once "the reason we are here [at the company] is to make each other look good". I was a pretty cheeky dev back then, but that day I didn't say anything. In my mind I thought "no, we're here to make the online products and services look good".

You can invest time worrying about how things look or how things are, not both. Too much positivity or eggshell-treading or dancing around the truth and high-fiving when discussing or evaluating ideas can be an invisible poison for any business.

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#293

Post by hwstar » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:22 PM UTC

Thriptic wrote: post #233

outside1234 wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

one thing: as a lead, i can tell you that managers are just as abused often times as the worker. that's where this pressure on the worker comes from: there is systematic top down hierarchical pressure applied that works almost like hydraulics. A sociopath like Bezos only has to beat down his 6 reports into accepting impossible goals (for a normal working schedule) and they will beat down their aggregate 48 reports an…

shit flows down hill

1. It gets amplified 10dB (power, not voltage) as it passes through each management level.

2. The amount of fear increases geometrically as you descend the management tree from the root.

3. The amount of bonus money for meeting profitability targets increases geometrically as you ascend the management tree from the leaves.

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#294

Post by rezashirazian » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:22 PM UTC

lrvick wrote: post #74

byuu wrote: post #40

I have a four-week rotation on-call where I work. Pretty much the same workload as discussed in the article with it. Calls and text messages at 3am, can't be more than 15 minutes away from an internet connection (remote desktop software on Android is a godsend.) While it doesn't feel unbearable, and pays fairly well (at least for the area I'm in), it definitely has completely destroyed my sleep schedule. I no longer…

You CAN quit. We are in an industry where you have to dodge recruiters trying to tackle you on your way to get coffee if you have any technical skill. Recruiters that represent companies capable of paying your mortgage and some probably well needed vacations. Personally I have folded companies, quit jobs, and turned away opprotunities that represented substantially more than I make now. People have called these choic…

This is the best comment I've seen all day. People forget that chewing and spitting out underperformance is not a monopoly possessed by the employer.

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#295

Post by imgabe » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:25 PM UTC

VikingCoder wrote: post #290

imgabe wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I ignored that part because it's plainly hyperbole. There are no commercial flights to Syria at this time, as there generally aren't to any active war zone. Even if a company wanted to send an employee there, they couldn't. Plus it's not going to look good when you bring up the email ordering you to go to a war zone where the company has no business interests or even an active office during your wrongful termination…

> Even if a company wanted to send an employee there, they couldn't. You don't need a commercial flight to go somewhere. Don't fight something you think is hyperbole with hyperbole. > If you want to keep coming up with excuses for why employees need to put up with bullshit from companies Slow down. I'm documenting the kind of BS companies pull. I'm not endorsing it. My mom was essentially fired for having cancer. It…

> You don't need a commercial flight to go somewhere. Don't fight something you think is hyperbole with hyperbole.

Are you seriously contending that sending an employee into an active war zone is something an actual employer [1] is actually capable of doing? Since you're documenting BS companies pull, care to provide any documentation of something like that actually happening? Whatever Amazon is like, I'm pretty sure they're not going to go to the trouble of flying someone halfway around the world and arranging transport into a war zone just because they went home at 5pm.

Yes, companies pull all kinds of shady shit, but they're not gods. There are laws, and failing that, public shaming. If you act powerless, you'll be powerless.

[1] Aside from the military, or a defense contractor, or other company where employees would be aware that such an assignment is a possible requirement of their employment.

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#296

Post by bsder » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:34 PM UTC

abajaj2280 wrote: post #18

FatalErrorr wrote: post #2

Why. Why oh why didn't he quit? This sounds AWFUL.

Honestly, I ask myself this all the time when I read horror stories from employees at tech companies. Just leave!

Tech jobs aren't as liquid as you think.

Sure, he can move to another job that has the same kind of stupid demands. However, finding a job that doesn't have those kinds of demands isn't so easy. Now, let's add in the stress of uprooting your family as well as a new job where you have to prove yourself (so you're probably going to be spending the same number of hours, anyway, for a while) and it's not so obvious a choice.

The real solution is for labor laws to start biting and saying that salaried workers are to be compensated after 40 hours and have it enforced. Once you have to pay a salaried worker overtime and a shift differential, they'll hire another worker.

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#297

Post by mikestew » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:35 PM UTC

nogridbag wrote: post #154

s3nnyy wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people are fooled by prestige. PG's elaboration on it changed my life: "Your opinions about what's admirable are always going to be slightly influenced by prestige, so if two options seem equal to you, you probably have more genuine admiration for the less prestigious one. [...] If you admire two kinds of work equally, but one is more prestigious, you should probably choose the other." ( http://www.paulgraham.co…

I chose a similar route because of perks and pay. My only fear is this choice hurting my future employment when I'll likely be discriminated due to age. I would imagine having Google or Facebook on my resume would surely make getting a job at age 50+ much easier.

I'm 50+, I have Microsoft on my resume. Just like everyone else in the Seattle area. No one cares that I worked there 10 years ago.

That's not to say that I have trouble finding work in my decrepit old age, but that's a different discussion.

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#298

Post by jazzyk » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:35 PM UTC

bkeroack wrote: post #247

radiorental wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've never understood the logic of giving up the things you enjoy in life to gain time in the future to enjoy life. I'm all for frugal but life isn't a dress rehearsal.

There's a great moment in the documentary about Joan Rivers[1] before she died (was killed, basically). Sitting in her opulent, probably immensely expensive Manhattan penthouse apartment, in the middle of a discussion about how much money she has to make to stay afloat, she said something to the effect of: "Sure I could live carefully and it would be easy, but who wants to live carefully?". The point being, if you en…

Except that she worked for herself, she loved what she did and did not really have much of a life outside of the spotlight.

Can't compare her to some poor schmuck slaving away for Amazon (or some such), who most likely is NOT enjoying his lifestyle/work.

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#299

Post by jazzyk » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:41 PM UTC

bkeroack wrote: post #242

s3nnyy wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That might sound crazy but on a software engineering salary, you can retire before 50 if you get used to spending little on food, transportation and shelter. My most favorite online resource on how to live frugally is this: http://earlyretirementextreme.com/how-i-became-financially-i... .

Retirement is mainly appealing to those who don't like what they do for a living.

Retirement is mainly appealing to those who have other interests outside of work or want to do good/interesting things which don't necessarily produce income.

Re: My husband needed therapy after working for Amazon

#300

Post by tankerdude » Wed, Aug 19, 2015, 7:45 PM UTC

ohitsdom wrote: post #155

> When our first daughter was about a month old, my husband was asked to go on a business trip. I imagine he could have turned that down, but I was insistent that he go so that his managers would not worry that his home life was impacting his work ethic. This is the Amazon way, after all. It was also one of the loneliest weeks of my life. Amazon seems to have serious issues, but this one is on the employee/spouse. If…

The role of management is not to get every last drop of work out of you. With the risk of being redundant, management is really about management. You need to recognize when to push them and when not to. From the looks of it, it's push all the time in the team that this person was over at Amazon. That's a failure of management.

It costs a lot to train a new employee, and reduces productivity and morale. So managers worth their salt would do one of many things to prevent this type of burnout.

Predictability is what management wants as well as employees, believe it or not. If you are an effective manager, you either create predictability and a good work/life balance or you might as well not be there. You're basically a fire fighter in that case, and it doesn't help with long term predictability.

Managers who worth their salt will go to bat to get people the time they want/need. If also need to recognize when it is time to walk away, and that's what I tell people when I do interview. If I don't correct the predictability scenario in terms of meeting business needs, I should be fired. If I don't get the tools that I need to get the results, it would be on me to walk away after informing them of the structural problems (and solutions to help them). I suspect that Amazon has a number of people who are purely focused on the bottom line of velocity and don't care about burn out. I'm sure though, that there are good groups to work for at Amazon, but the ratio might be lower than at other tech companies, from what I gather.