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Amazon Pip Horror Story

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Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#431

Post by aaviran »

transitory_pce wrote: post #6

This is a phenomenon common to all low grade/incompetent dev managers: When a dev asks for a team change they view it as a slap in the face because it has happened to them so often in the past and they take it as a personal offence. The fact is they are lousy managers and usually incompetent and nobody wants to work in their team. So they go on the offensive and try to manage the dev out before senior management real…

This might not be the case here. As the OP theorized, they were already on the way out of the team, so why not use them to fill up the PIP quotas?

The manager might not be incompetent, but they sure are an asshole

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#432

Post by spaceywilly »

dininski wrote: post #180

Some people meet this with a healthy level of scepticism, which is great. However I used to work at Amazon, working on the performance evaluation and HR tools used within the company. It was a couple of years back, but I am fairly certain that the same tools are still used, given that all of them were developed from scratch. At the time it was in line with the company's PR of removing its toxic work culture. It's wor…

“ eventually leaving him the only person competent enough to make changes to it”

erm, this makes it sound like he was a not a very good engineer. Your code should always be written so that if you get hit by a bus one day, the rest of your team could pick right up where you left off

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#433

Post by [deleted] »

mabbo wrote: post #354

I spent almost a decade at Amazon. Their system for removing low performers has two key flaws. First, the mandatory minimums. If an org is full of superstars, the org still has to ensure it has at least X% turnover per year, so a superstar has to go. Usually well-performing devs whose manager wasn't skilled enough to convince the larger group that all of their people are superstars. It's cruel, unfair, and harms the…

[deleted]

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#434

Post by Fiahil »

alistairSH wrote: post #328
Jolter wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where do you live that 700€ a DAY is low pay? It’s, that’s MORE than 700$ a day, not less. Consider that most parts of the world have lower cost of living than the Bay Area.

That’s roughly equivalent to 120,000 Euro/year once normalized for taxes (~50% for self-employed, ~30% for employees). I have no idea what typical salaries are in the EU, but that’s on the low end of mid-career for much of the US.

Hold on, 700€ x 215 days worked (you don't count vacation time when freelance) = 150 500. Now, give it half to the taxman, and you're left with 75 250€ / year.

And that's without the expenses, extra healthcare coverage, insurance etc.

So pretty average when you considering that junior developer salaries are within this reach in EU capitals.

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#435

Post by dec0dedab0de »

goldenkey wrote: post #288
dec0dedab0de wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know it's not the point, but how/why did you have $100 worth of pizza in the refrigerator? Edit: I'm trying to imagine scenarios where that could happen, I have two so far. You ordered pizza for a meeting that got canceled, and the office refrigerator was huge. Or you ordered from a fancy pizza place that had waygu or something as a topping. I'm sorry, I don't know why this is bothering me so much.

It was 5 of the expensive pies from https://www.seriouspieseattle.com/serious-take-out-ballard/ I had gotten them for myself and a friend. They are small pies so a single person can easily eat two of them.

Ok, so that explains how they fit in the refrigerator. Though it's still confusing why you would buy 5 pizzas and put them in the fridge. Is it common around there to buy pizza in advanced and reheat it? Or were they just leftovers, and I was thinking too much about it?

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#436

Post by LadyCoconut »

urthor wrote: post #232
pm90 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it really? Seems an unnecessarily stressful way to get experience. I kinda agree with the OP, I would have a lot of trust issues with management if they pulled this shit on me.

I'm convinced human beings are naturally designed to operate at 120% for 6-12 week long periods. \ Hunter gatherer survivalist genes just kick in. YMMV, but I consider it a healthy thing for, at least for some part of your career, to work "Amazon hard." Aka, all the reasons that people list when they say you should really try working for a startup. When you push yourself to your limits at your profession, a lot of st…

Human beings are not designed to operate at 120% for 6-12 week long periods; they're designed to survive it. The difference is important.

Working at such a rhythm helped me learn much. It also durably damaged my body (both because it chipped away at my health and because it made me forego health check-up), my mental health, and made me lose personal connections. To this day, I'm still picking up the pieces.

Human beings are also "designed" to survive long period of hunger if need be, but no one would argue that going without for a week is a fine and healthy way to lose weight.

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#437

Post by coliveira »

duncangh wrote: post #340
sgt101 wrote: post #139

This comment killed me : Will Ye Will Ye Engineering @ Cohere (cohere.io) 5mo Back when I worked at Amazon as a software engineer, the CRAZIEST thing happened to me. Here’s the story… I was working from home with my girlfriend (at the time), when suddenly I get an urgent ping from my coworker: “Our service is experiencing a SEV 2! We need all hands on deck!” Uh oh, our team’s application has gone down! However, as I…

Lmao this is great because on my "virtual on-site" final round of interviews at Amazon, the fire alarm of the person who was interviewing me went off. She switched to audio on the call and continued to try to work through the little coding challenge as she was shouting implementation details above the echo-y wails of a fire alarm raging in a crowded stairwell. Baffled, concerned for her safety and bewildered by her p…

This was probably a fire drill. The alarms sound off, everybody leaves the building at the same time, but it is just for training.

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#438

Post by sergiotapia »

murderfs wrote: post #85

Stories have two sides, someone on blind posted the following, and no one's challenged it so presumably it's true: > The guy made 24 CRs in his entire career at amazon, all in just one CDK package. > 50% of his CRs are merged without approval. > So, yeah, there you go !

What is a "CR"? And a "CDK"?

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#440

Post by coliveira »

snowman-yelling wrote: post #430
_fat_santa wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon vs Amazon on Blind

Exactly. I’ve been here for two years, not a long time by any means, and I don’t personally know a single instance of anyone getting pipped. I’ve never felt pressured to work overtime, haven’t had to race to meet an unreasonable deadline, and I’ve been rated exceeds on both of the performance evals I’ve been though. The Amazon I’ve experienced is much different than the one I read about before joining.

Every group is different. It depends on the manager, the priorities, the projects, etc. But I imagine you'll be thinking different in a few years.
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