Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I lasted three minutes at Amazon

old.reddit.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 192 posts

Re: I lasted three minutes at Amazon

#21

Post by zamalek »

beaconstudios wrote: post #10
johnny35 wrote: post #4

Systematizing and optimizing every detail of operations to create as large of a pool as possible of positions requiring the least possible skill, reducing the cost of turnover, training, and management complexity... seems to be externalizing a heavy toll on mental health. Regulation can tackle many cases of "socialized losses, privatized gains" but I am at a loss to understand how we can mitigate this one.

this reads like the opposite of a systematised process - this reads like a bunch of departments who don't talk to each other striving to check off tasks in the onboarding process without actually making any effort to complete the intent of the task. Which would make sense at a highly metric-driven company like Amazon.

That's the inherent problem with quantifiable performance reviews: people optimize metrics, not results.

Re: I lasted three minutes at Amazon

#22

Post by Waterluvian »

I don’t mean to be rude to those who are seeking a living, but let’s call this what it is.

It’s not a hiring process. There is no interview. They aren’t interested in working with you to figure out if you’re a good fit for each other.

They’re trawling the ocean and filtering the catch through drug and background tests. They process countless people every day, constantly replacing others who have broken down or reached EOL. Nobody here is meant to be anything but a cheap robot with decent sensor-end effector coordination. In fact, their humanity is a liability that Amazon begrudgingly tolerates, largely because it has to.

We need robots in the worst possible way to replace any and every job that people would never choose to do as a hobby.

Re: I lasted three minutes at Amazon

#23

Post by Sparkyte »

beaconstudios wrote: post #10
johnny35 wrote: post #4

Systematizing and optimizing every detail of operations to create as large of a pool as possible of positions requiring the least possible skill, reducing the cost of turnover, training, and management complexity... seems to be externalizing a heavy toll on mental health. Regulation can tackle many cases of "socialized losses, privatized gains" but I am at a loss to understand how we can mitigate this one.

this reads like the opposite of a systematised process - this reads like a bunch of departments who don't talk to each other striving to check off tasks in the onboarding process without actually making any effort to complete the intent of the task. Which would make sense at a highly metric-driven company like Amazon.

Amazon has a tendency to go through the show and tell in the hiring process but not commit through it. It isn't his fault. I'm sure he could've stood up for himself. However this is the flaw when you're just too big to succeed.

Re: I lasted three minutes at Amazon

#26

Post by woodruffw »

beaconstudios wrote: post #10
johnny35 wrote: post #4

Systematizing and optimizing every detail of operations to create as large of a pool as possible of positions requiring the least possible skill, reducing the cost of turnover, training, and management complexity... seems to be externalizing a heavy toll on mental health. Regulation can tackle many cases of "socialized losses, privatized gains" but I am at a loss to understand how we can mitigate this one.

this reads like the opposite of a systematised process - this reads like a bunch of departments who don't talk to each other striving to check off tasks in the onboarding process without actually making any effort to complete the intent of the task. Which would make sense at a highly metric-driven company like Amazon.

There are many metrics that large companies can internally optimize for, one of which is ass-covering. It sounds like Amazon is no different from any other company in that regard.

Re: I lasted three minutes at Amazon

#27

Post by ushakov »

Waterluvian wrote: post #22

I don’t mean to be rude to those who are seeking a living, but let’s call this what it is. It’s not a hiring process. There is no interview. They aren’t interested in working with you to figure out if you’re a good fit for each other. They’re trawling the ocean and filtering the catch through drug and background tests. They process countless people every day, constantly replacing others who have broken down or reache…

isn't this the same with tech jobs though?

you are just as replaceable and the interview process is only there to filter out the bad candidates

it's only more intense because the cost/risk ratio is magnitudes higher

Re: I lasted three minutes at Amazon

#28

Post by SpicyLemonZest »

throwawaysea wrote: post #20

I have no idea whether this story is real or not, given it is on a subreddit called "antiwork". But if true, that just sounds offensively miserable, unfair, and unprofessional. Rather that dissecting all those issues though, all I will say is that I wish we had more competition for these behemoth companies. They soak up so much of our economy that there can't be real competition against them. What scrappy retailer is…

It seems very hard to argue that at least Walmart isn't offering real competition against Amazon.

Re: I lasted three minutes at Amazon

#30

Post by Johnny555 »

dekhn wrote: post #5

I had to read carefully into the article before I understood this is probably a fulfillment center job, not an AWS SWE.

I figured that out in the second paragraph when he said "drug test" - I think they'd have an awful hard time hiring engineers if they required drug testing. I don't do drugs (not even marijuana even though it's legal here), but I'd refuse to take a drug test just on principle - they are paying for my performance at work, not for what I do on my own time.

The only time I worked at a job that required drug tests, was at a transportation company where federal law required it.

Post reply on HN