Stock price changing in a direction that makes Amazon seem generous while costing Amazon nothing? No problem!
Stock price changing in a direction that costs Amazon money? Nope, nuh-uh, not a chance.
Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
41–50 of 175 posts
Re: Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
#42Earlier quoted context omitted.
It wasn't just Steve Jobs. It's never just one person. Many people enable punitive & regressive decisions like that.
This is what's great about being a CEO! Things go bad? Ship is too big to steer, the failure is on the whole company, the CEO didn't even know, they swear! Things go right? Obviously it was all the hard work of the CEO they definitely deserve millions in bonuses! It was Steve Jobs, so was the wage-fixing. They were all so stupid about it they literally got busted doing it. Doesn't matter what the company makes, only…
yeah no one ever makes the argument that Steve Jobs doesn't deserve 100% of the credit for Apple's success
Re: Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
#43I don't get it (I never worked for Amazon!).
I've never worked anywhere, where a change in my employer's stock price means my pay has to be recalculated.
If you're promoted and given a raise, isn't that a deal? Suppose I'm a happy coder on $X, and you promote me to the miserable job of Project Manager on $X+10, how's it legal to call me into the office and explain that it's actually $X+2?
Is compensation at Amazon stated in virtual shares or something?
Re: Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
In your compensation letter it may say a $ value but it’s just a formulaic presentation based on the fixed # of RSUs. You’re not compensated by “You’re getting $20,000 in however many RSUs that can buy at the time”. It’s “you’re getting 100 RSUs” and then whenever you get them your compensation letter states their current $ value.
Not Amazon, but when I receive RSUs it is denominated in the dollar amount. In a year when the first part vests the dollars are converted to stock units based on the price at that moment. Thus I do not know how many units of stock I am receiving until the first vesting event, because I don't know what the price will be in a year.
That makes no sense at all. Why not just give you cash with an X year delay.
Re: Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
#45Two things going on here:
1. First, I'm a bit baffled by some of the responses along the lines of "Amazon should just own their mistake". Sorry, but in the real world, "finders keepers" rarely applies (unless you're talking about crypto, but I digress...). I would certainly want a bug corrected if it were in my favor, and if a bug went the other way, I might need to re-evaluate my company satisfaction based on my new comp, but I have literally never seen a case of "sorry, payroll system made an error, but never mind you can keep it". It literally never works like that in any case, e.g. I work in fintech and if a bank accidentally deposits money into your account and you spend it, you can go to jail [1] - the bank doesn't say "whoops, our bad".
2. Many people who joined the workforce after the Great Recession have never had to deal with falling stock prices, and basically have just come to expect that the equity portion of their compensation should be like cash. The whole point of equity compensation is for it to be variable based on the success of the company. I get it, I wouldn't be happy with my compensation falling either (and I've certainly been there, in the .com bust), but I don't have much sympathy for folks who are just discovering that the variable component of their compensation can, in fact, be variable in the negative.
[1] https://abc13.com/spending-cash-bank-error-teller-error-can-...
Re: Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
It wasn't just Steve Jobs. It's never just one person. Many people enable punitive & regressive decisions like that.
This is what's great about being a CEO! Things go bad? Ship is too big to steer, the failure is on the whole company, the CEO didn't even know, they swear! Things go right? Obviously it was all the hard work of the CEO they definitely deserve millions in bonuses! It was Steve Jobs, so was the wage-fixing. They were all so stupid about it they literally got busted doing it. Doesn't matter what the company makes, only…
I for one am perfectly happy with the mid 6 figures that trickle down to us lowly ICEs...
Re: Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
#47I do hope some Amazon employees walk back working at Amazon over this.
Re: Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
#48The raises had to be approved though, right? It seems like an excuse to blame software for this. And it seems really off-putting that they wouldn’t just own the error, but instead try to revert it.
no such thing as "bank error in your favor" anymore i suppose
There has never been such a thing as a "bank error in your favor", and folks are living in a fantasy land if they think there has been.
Re: Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
#49The raises had to be approved though, right? It seems like an excuse to blame software for this. And it seems really off-putting that they wouldn’t just own the error, but instead try to revert it.
no such thing as "bank error in your favor" anymore i suppose
Never was, except in Monopoly money terms.
Re: Amazon walking back raises after internal bug miscalculated compensation
#50https://archive.ph/Odmns
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