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Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

nytimes.com

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Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#61

Post by zzalpha »

danielweber wrote: post #59
zzalpha wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So to be clear you feel your one anecdote as an intern invalidates the numerous accounts of career Amazon employees? And it's the articles that are ridiculous?

Lots of people are providing tales of their personal Amazon experiences. Many of them are bad. This one happens to be good. The way groupthink happens is when the minority is afraid to express their thoughts.

And the way bad reasoning happens is by assuming an anecdotal outlier disproves a trend.

Amazon as sweatshop isn't even news (I've been ignoring their recruiters for years for this very reason). Why anyone would even attempt to deny that, I really don't know.

The only difference, now, is folks in the mainstream are talking about it.

Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#62

Post by kbenson »

pacala wrote: post #29
MCRed wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In 2014 I worked for a company where the whole team quit. From Summer to fall they built a team who built a product. By february all of them had quit or been fired, except for one programmer (and me who had just been hired.) Did the company learn from this? no. We built a new team, built a new product, and by february of the next year we had all quit. They are now on their third team. Nothings changed . Management co…

Where on earth do they find money to pay the wages for each wave of employees? Are their shareholders blind?

Depending on their existing revenue sources, the size of the dev teams compared to the whole company, and money in the bank, they might be able to do this a few times before they are completely swamped in technical debt to the point of being unable to achieve anything.

Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#63

Post by kelukelugames »

greggman wrote: post #11
astrowilliam wrote: post #4

I've worked at a big internet company where the culture was very toxic and not a good place to work, let alone be a normal human being. Pushy, rude and underhanded people were plentiful and were willing to throw you so far under the bus at any given moment that you would never find your way back out. This became evident to me when I went on my lunch break after working there for about 4 months. Each employee was give…

I probably shouldn't post this but what the heck. I quit on the spot twice when a company was dickish. Once I had a friend, previous co-worker, that would visit. He'd come into my office and we'd play games (this was a game company). This had happened about once every month or 2 for a year or so. One time I had to go to the restroom. I came back and he was gone. The new boss had escorted him out of the office. I quit…

I'm in the middle of writing a 1,500 word article about the toxic work environment I left. Wish I could finish earlier so it could be topical.

Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#64

Post by carrotleads »

MCRed wrote: post #37
libber wrote: post #22

I found this interesting, feels like the most realistic account so far - http://pastebin.com/BjD84BQ3 I just feel bad for amazon people I meet, the 2 year cliff and high pressure oncall simply isn't a thing at the other tech companies. At least for me and ive worked at a few of them (plural of anicdote isn't data but still) Life seems strictly worse at amazon.

His account seems much better than what I experienced. I still think he has swallowed too much koolaide-- and this is why Amazon focuses on the young kids they can make an impression on.

He had stated that he did drink the koolaid initially...

seems like a matter of fact version..

Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#65

Post by jmgtan »

Been reading a lot of Amazon articles the past few weeks. I'll be joining AWS next month as an SA. I met the hiring manager during the interview loop, and he seems like a cool guy. Funny thing is when I told my family and friends that I'll be joining AWS they all emailed me the NYT expose.

Well I do hope it's not as bad as it's portrayed. I do want to see my son grow up (he is turning 2 years old).

Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#66

Post by Crito »

Frondo wrote: post #60
Crito wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think a union would solve this . I'd sooner quit a shitty job than stay in it, and hope the union makes it better for me. Much faster turnaround when I take matters into my own hand. If this were the sort of industry where I couldn't be working again with higher pay within the week, then maybe I'd consider sticking around for organized action..

Of course it would. It'd solve it before you even got into the position, by mandating that you put in your 40 hours and then left to enjoy the weekend, see your family, etc. And before anyone says "but I want to be paid on merit not seniority hur hur," remember, it's your union . You want your union to fight for merit-based pay and not seniority-based pay? Fine, go for it. Unions are democratic, so you shouldn't have…

Why would I put up with waiting for collective action to work, if I can improve my lot in life by simply changing companies? I'm not going to stick around at the company just to help out my coworkers. I feel zero loyalty to them.

Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#67

Post by jqm »

danielweber wrote: post #55
orthoganol wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've done the same, heated in the moment. Basically our two most senior devs quit, so a large burden shifted onto me, and I was suddenly the most tenured dev on our team, with knowledge of systems no one else had and could not even easily get since the others (and others before) had quit. But curiously they promoted the new guy instead of me. Ok fine... I told my boss, an arrogant VP at the company, that I should be…

I've never thought "I left that job too early." I have often thought I left too late. One job in particular I should have called their bullshit was when the CEO had one (in a long line of) hissy fit and said he was quitting in a month's time. I was trying to keep the company together, but what I -- the senior developer and the sole maintainer of the company's one revenue-generating product -- should have done was sen…

I've never thought "I left that job too early." I have often thought I left too late.

Yep. Me too. Thanks for distilling something I have often thought.

Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#68

Post by justinv »

MCRed wrote: post #30
onaplane wrote: post #21

Okay, these articles are getting really ridiculous. I just finished a Summer internship at Amazon. While it's true that there's more pressure on employees than other places I've worked, it's really not that bad. It definitely doesn't feel cutthroat, and an 80-85 hour work week is definitely not normal! The vast majority (I'd say >70%, and I think that's conservative) of people work 35-45, depending on what needs to g…

Sorry, your internship is not representative. They are trying got trick you into working there. You were treated special in a number of ways. Further, AWS is isolated to some extend from the abusive nature of the company by being a separate division. A lot of what you say is right out of the amazon weltanshaung-- its cult has seeped in to some extent. You're giving us rationalizations for the abusive nature of the wo…

I'm a former intern from AWS (6 month non-tech internship). Now I work in a completely different part of the company full time.

My experience is exactly like what 'onaplane' wrote. Internship was great & very rewarding from a career/working on cool stuff perspective. What I saw was that people who worked long did it because they wanted to (I work(ed) long sometimes because I wanted to!). 40-50 was the norm for AWS & it's roughly the same on the retail side. Are there bad teams at Amazon? Absolutely. Are there awesome ones? Yep!

"A lot of what you say is right out of the amazon weltanshaung-- its cult has seeped in to some extent."

You're doing the exact same thing in reverse.

Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#69

Post by wpietri »

astrowilliam wrote: post #4

I've worked at a big internet company where the culture was very toxic and not a good place to work, let alone be a normal human being. Pushy, rude and underhanded people were plentiful and were willing to throw you so far under the bus at any given moment that you would never find your way back out. This became evident to me when I went on my lunch break after working there for about 4 months. Each employee was give…

The "insubordination" thing is killing me.

As a manager, one of my highest goals is to get people to be usefully insubordinate. So many people, thanks to controlling bosses or color-inside-the-lines education, will just do whatever they think powerful people want. But I think we all do our best work when we're thinking for ourselves about how to best serve our users and treat our colleagues.

Good for you! I hope you keep being "insubordinate" wherever you go.

Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way

#70

Post by wpietri »

Crito wrote: post #66
Frondo wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it would. It'd solve it before you even got into the position, by mandating that you put in your 40 hours and then left to enjoy the weekend, see your family, etc. And before anyone says "but I want to be paid on merit not seniority hur hur," remember, it's your union . You want your union to fight for merit-based pay and not seniority-based pay? Fine, go for it. Unions are democratic, so you shouldn't have…

Why would I put up with waiting for collective action to work, if I can improve my lot in life by simply changing companies? I'm not going to stick around at the company just to help out my coworkers. I feel zero loyalty to them.

In that case, on behalf of your coworkers, I encourage your plan of leaving.

For the rest of us, though, quitting often doesn't help. Shitty workplaces are commonplace. Jointly pushing back (which doesn't require a union) can create a place that you don't want to leave, one where you can have more confidence that it will stay good even as executives come and go.

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