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Public protest against Amazon

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Re: Public protest against Amazon

#401

Post by oarabbus_ »

org3432 wrote: post #243
castlecrasher2 wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>One manager I had was pretty candid about it, he said he couldn't find another job and was looking to retire so he was going to give me a bad performance review despite actually being the top performer so he wouldn't be affected. He was otherwise very apologetic that his hand was forced. I must be dense because I don't understand this. Your manager couldn't find another job, was instead looking to retire, and gave y…

Yep, the tl;dr is that at the time my manager's manager didn't appreciate me being transparent on mistakes our department made with other depts. So in an effort to make me quit, aside from other things, he wrote a review for my direct manager and required him to say it was his review. If he didn't he would be fired. Pretty normal stuff at a certain level with insecure managers. Not exactly the same, but Steve Jobs wr…

Ambitious and risk-averse aren't traits I see in the same person very often

Re: Public protest against Amazon

#402

Post by curiousDog »

Word of advice, never work for Amazon. Out of the FANGs, it is quite easily the sleaziest place to work. As someone who worked there, I can believe OPs side of the story. At this point, most of the people who tolerate working there are indentured Indian H1-B employees because they’re stuck in the Green card queue. Even amongst them, the good ones left for greener pastures a long time ago!

Re: Public protest against Amazon

#403

Post by lewisinc »

I feel like I should point out the value in surrounding yourself with people like Oleg here who 1. Have a completely different socioeconomic perspective than someone like myself, and 2. Feel (rightfully) entitled to voice their opinion on anything and everything that the judge to be of enough importance to voice such an opinion.

If anyone in the Seattle-area values an engineer who will voice such opinions on ethics and morality above their own career-oriented self-interest, perhaps extend an invitation to an interview. Because surely there is no safeguard in place that will save this man and his family from being fired and then deported.

Re: Public protest against Amazon

#404

Post by raverbashing »

amzn_throwaway7 wrote: post #335

The author of the article posted their Amazon user name, so I decided to look them up. I'll start with raw data, and then inject my own thoughts: * The author is the bottom contributor on his team by a large margin. Their few contributions are primarily configuration changes and pixel pushes. * The author hasn't made any contributions since last August, likely due to a leave of absence * The author's manager has rece…

So you "voluntarily" decided to burn a colleague in public because of an opinion post?

If someone is on a PIP that should stay between a worker and his/her manager, or stay inside a team at most

The good reviews of that manager can be explained by people knowing how the system works and not willing to rock the boat. I've seen it happen, but when a manager tried any funny business with the team, he hadn't realized the team was very united and impervious to his shenanigans.

Together with several "anonymous" comments at his blogpost telling to dismiss his comments because of his bad English (which is obviously due to it being his 2nd language but it is not bad per se)

Thanks for writing this post, it really highlights what can be expected from this company.

Re: Public protest against Amazon

#405

Post by hbosch »

amzn_throwaway7 wrote: post #322

I agree with many of the comments here about how ymmv based on your management chain. My experience at Amazon has been very positive, but I do want to call out some major issues with the Amazon Connections tool reference in this post. This tool is pitched to employees as an anonymous way to provide feedback about their team via daily questions. The reality is anything but. * Responses are not anonymous, they are view…

FWIW I have heard that org leaders can manually insert questions, deny some default questions, and generally tailor the Connections to the types of things they want tactical feedback on. I contracted for a different Amazon team and saw plenty of Connection. They were often bland, “How many hours a week do you spend in meetings?” “True/False: when I begin a project goals are outlined clearly” “When was the last time you sought direct customer feedback for a decision?” Etc. nothing like what you mentioned.

Re: Public protest against Amazon

#406

Post by BOOSTERHIDROGEN »

kamaal wrote: post #397
forgotmypw3 wrote: post #13

I want to preface this comment with a statement that in no way am I trying to blame the victim here, only to point out what can be learned from this situation. This is certainly not the first time I've heard of Amazon being a shitty place to work at, and I don't see much reason to doubt the story of a vindictive boss doing everything they can to make an employee miserable after learning that the employee submitted ba…

>>Never submit negative feedback via "anonymous" or "confidential" feedback processes at work Never give feedback at work, unless positive. This includes things like code review. The dirty little secret of human relationships is every one wants to be made to feel special, error less and look good. Only thing any kind of feed back, correction or criticism leads to is rivalry/enmity, and it won't end well. The question…

Do you have any good resources how to give feedback in work/relationships?

Re: Public protest against Amazon

#407

Post by vxNsr »

btilly wrote: post #366
jimmy1 wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly. I work at a very similar place on the East Coast -- very startup like culture unified by leadership principles. I had one so-so experience, followed by an absolutely horrible experience, followed by two terrific experiences. For the bad experience, I worked weeks on end, lots of times throughout the night trying to deliever, in many cases, unreasonable feature requests all while trying to maintain production…

I lose respect for any man who cheats on his wife, no matter the reason... That's some sanctimonious bullshit. There is zero public information indicating any cheating. We know that there was a trial separation. We don't know what agreements there were. We do know that the divorce is being presented as being amiable. My attitude is that if his soon to be ex wife is not upset, then random strangers like yourself have…

I thought Bezos admitted to cheating in his medium post.

Re: Public protest against Amazon

#408

Post by hbosch »

jmspring wrote: post #396

Given the abuses mentioned, even in WA, if there was legitimate documentation of things like “be in by 7am”, HR would have worked with the situation - shitty manager or not.

I’ve heard at Amazon, if you are on a PIP, if you manager tells you to juggle bananas on a unicycle and you don’t make a damn good attempt you can be fired. Probably hyperbole, but still.

Re: Public protest against Amazon

#409

Post by hellllllllooo »

amzn_throwaway7 wrote: post #335

The author of the article posted their Amazon user name, so I decided to look them up. I'll start with raw data, and then inject my own thoughts: * The author is the bottom contributor on his team by a large margin. Their few contributions are primarily configuration changes and pixel pushes. * The author hasn't made any contributions since last August, likely due to a leave of absence * The author's manager has rece…

Anonymously sharing incomplete personal information about someone you haven't worked with from Amazon's internal systems and making an assessment of them by the number of commits they have made isn't really making a strong case for Amazon having a good culture.

Re: Public protest against Amazon

#410

Post by docker_up »

I had an horrible experience with a terrible manager about 10 years ago. We didn't get along at all, and he tried to throw me under the bus for a project that he mismanaged. He basically wrote lies about me on my performance review.

I fought it via HR. The HR rep couldn't care less about it, but I kept persisting, and I had my coworkers vouch for me that what our manager said was false. He ended up rescinding the entire performance review, and I changed teams and left the company shortly afterwards.

But I was lucky. I was well-liked by my peers because they knew I worked hard, and they were willing to go to bat for me against our manager. And my manager was utterly stupid because he wrote lies that could be refuted by my teammates. It was basically the perfect conditions in my favor. Had I not had those favorable conditions, I'm pretty sure HR would have done nothing to help me, and I would have gotten fired. Even if managers write lies about you, it's very very difficult to fight back.

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