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AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

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Re: AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

#111

Post by tennisflyi »

22c wrote: post #20
benoau wrote: post #3

I wonder which tech company will be the first to take this too far and implode because of some easily-avoidable cataclysm. I think in some ways you could say Twitter / X already did although they are still limping along for now...

I remember reading a blog post many years ago that stuck with me, I don't remember the title of the post or who wrote it but it was essentially along the lines of "beware when companies start to take away the free snacks". It made a pretty convincing argument about how even seemingly minor changes like that start to signal a greater shift in the companies attitude toward how they want to treat and be perceived by the…

> I remember reading a blog post many years ago that stuck with me, I don't remember the title of the post or who wrote it but it was essentially along the lines of "beware when companies start to take away the free snacks".

Most don't even have them... but ok

Re: AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

#112

Post by sublinear »

If there are this many workers unhappy and about to quit, I wonder if this is a watershed moment for Amazon as a company and its investors.

AWS is a huge part of their revenue isn't it? This also affects pretty much every tech company since they all use AWS to some extent.

Re: AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

#113

Post by EnergyAmy »

kcplate wrote: post #108
faizshah wrote: post #6

The fact that US labour laws are this weak is a travesty. You can just circumvent severance by making working conditions unpleasant and you don’t even need to hide it.

I post this every time this topic comes up. But WFH and remote work ability are an exception to the rule in almost every industry/job type other than tech (and sales). Effectively everybody else goes someplace other than home to do their job. I love it, I prefer it, but I recognize that I am lucky to have a career that can offer it. If my company demanded RTO, I would have to weigh the option and perhaps choose to se…

That's the wrong way to look at it IMO. It's a way that spreads divisiveness and has an unstated pro-business bias.

I think of it as tech workers tend to get treated as people in some ways instead of cattle, and we should work to ensure that everyone gets those benefits. In other words, it's not a privilege that should be shamed or guilted, it's that tech workers are able to demand basic respect on some things.

Re: AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

#115

Post by ajajsjxkdndj »

squiffsquiff wrote: post #55

I realise this topic has been covered repeatedly but considering it from another angle: As an engineer employed by third party companies using AWS, this doesn't look good. I don't care if the support people are in an office. I do care if they're available and know what they're doing. There are other cloud providers available. For new entrants, what's Amazon's unique selling point?

I was relatively impressed with AWS support (business) back in 2016 or so. It’s been absolutely atrocious lately. Anecdotal of course.

Re: AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

#116

Post by kcplate »

EnergyAmy wrote: post #113
kcplate wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I post this every time this topic comes up. But WFH and remote work ability are an exception to the rule in almost every industry/job type other than tech (and sales). Effectively everybody else goes someplace other than home to do their job. I love it, I prefer it, but I recognize that I am lucky to have a career that can offer it. If my company demanded RTO, I would have to weigh the option and perhaps choose to se…

That's the wrong way to look at it IMO. It's a way that spreads divisiveness and has an unstated pro-business bias. I think of it as tech workers tend to get treated as people in some ways instead of cattle, and we should work to ensure that everyone gets those benefits. In other words, it's not a privilege that should be shamed or guilted, it's that tech workers are able to demand basic respect on some things.

No, it’s reality. Outside of a pure tech audience, literally no one gives a shit that your company wants you to RTO. I work from home but visit customers in all sorts of industries—manufacturing, finance, healthcare, insurance, retail. All of them are in office now or at a bare minimum hybrid, but with at least 3 days a week in office. So if the standard for most people who work is some portion of their time away from home for their job, then you are treating tech workers like people if you want them to RTO.

It’s divisive to demand WFH for a single class of worker.

Re: AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

#117

Post by aprilthird2021 »

locopati wrote: post #84
aprilthird2021 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No company will put this in an employment contract unless they are desperate to hire you, and if they are that desperate to hire you, you're in a whole other league than the people this news applies to.

This is not true. Remote companies and many hybrid companies will obviously make that part of your contract. When the fully remote company I worked for was acquired by a hybrid company, being guaranteed remote was a part of all of our contracts.

I worked for a fully remote company, and even though they did not have any physical offices to even have us come into, they refused to change in the contract where they reserved the right to have you work in a traditional office if they desired. They still are 100% remote to this day

Re: AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

#118

Post by consteval »

kcplate wrote: post #116
EnergyAmy wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the wrong way to look at it IMO. It's a way that spreads divisiveness and has an unstated pro-business bias. I think of it as tech workers tend to get treated as people in some ways instead of cattle, and we should work to ensure that everyone gets those benefits. In other words, it's not a privilege that should be shamed or guilted, it's that tech workers are able to demand basic respect on some things.

No, it’s reality. Outside of a pure tech audience, literally no one gives a shit that your company wants you to RTO. I work from home but visit customers in all sorts of industries—manufacturing, finance, healthcare, insurance, retail. All of them are in office now or at a bare minimum hybrid, but with at least 3 days a week in office. So if the standard for most people who work is some portion of their time away fro…

> It’s divisive to demand WFH for a single class of worker

... which nobody does. Rather people simply imagine they do, because they're intellectually lazy.

We go through this same conversation again and again and again. "Oh Starbucks workers make 15 an hour now?? Who do they think they are! I work construction and only make 12!"

"Oh Bucees gives three weeks vacation? Well I work much harder and I don't get any!"

"Wait California gets salary disclosure?? They're such wusses, I don't need that!!1!"

Of course we can go even further back, hundreds of years, and just replay those advancements but I'm tired. The point is that if you want improvement you PULL UP, not PUSH DOWN.

Shitting on yourself with the intention of making other's already shitty situations look not-that-shitty isn't valiant. It's pathetic, across the board. We should PULL UP each other, not PUSH DOWN each other. Then we all end up higher. You want to be fair BUT better - not fair but worse.

Re: AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

#119

Post by consteval »

wordofx wrote: post #28
Foobar8568 wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If your work contract and agreement has remote office, guess what? That's a breach of contract.

That’s a contract. The vast majority of people currently working from home do not have a contract explicitly stating it’s a work from home position permanently. Those people who went from office to home during covid will have to go back to the office or they will be fired and receive nothing because they did not fill their role.

This is an extremely pro-business perspective. Just because they can do it doesn't mean they're correct, and we should just bend over and spread our cheeks for them. Certainly, we shouldn't beg for them to fuck us, but apparently some of us are really craving it.

Re: AWS CEO tells workers to quit if they don't want to come back to the office

#120

Post by pal9000 »

ein0p wrote: post #83
pal9000 wrote: post #49

Amazon (aws) was by far the worst place I’ve worked. Literally every engineer was offered and this was in Germany, where the culture and labor laws are super employee friendly. Everything was soulless including the god ugly Chime and other internal tools. Although principles like bias for action, disagree and commit are pretty effective and cool. Just for work culture, I’d have preferred to work at Google or Facebook…

Idk about Meta, but Google is also pretty soul draining these days. Pre-Pichai it was a pretty cool place, but that was ages ago.

But are we bullish on Google in general, financially speaking? They are doing cool stuff with waymo but way behind on AI
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