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Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

bbc.com

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Re: Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

#241

Post by iamacyborg »

pjc50 wrote: post #189
chadash wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"job losses" is BBC editorializing. They do not use that term in their letter: https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/company-news/amazon-workfor...

I think we may be hitting an issue in translation between English and American; in British English "fired" implies "for cause", while a "blameless" process of headcount reduction is known as "redundancy". "Job losses" is a perfectly reasonable neutral phrase here. Indeed, under UK law and job contracts you generally cannot just chuck someone out of their job without either notice or cause or, for large companies, a s…

> Indeed, under UK law and job contracts you generally cannot just chuck someone out of their job without either notice or cause or, for large companies, a statutory redundancy process.

This is only true when an employee has worked for a company for 2 or more years

Re: Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

#242

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

jwmerrill wrote: post #198
latexr wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was just thinking the same, this is quite the weasel wording. Not only the “losses” but the passive voice. As if Amazon is a person who walked to work one day and realise it has a hole in its pocket from which thousands of jobs fell off. “Oh well, these things happen, not my fault and nothing I can do about it”, Amazon says as it shrugs its shoulders and whistles down the factory floor with a skip in its step.

“Passive voice” is a grammatical term. “Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses,” is not an example of the passive voice. “14,000 workers were fired by Amazon,” is an example of the passive voice. There is not a 1:1 relationship between being vague about agency and using the passive voice.

Grammatically correct, but missing the narrative subtext.

"Job losses" is a passive construction because it hides the fact that the agent - Amazon - made a deliberate and conscious decision to destroy these jobs.

People do occasionally lose things deliberately, but more usually it happens to someone through carelessness or accident, often with associated regret.

This is an example of framing, where a narrative spin is put on events.

"Amazon destroyed 14,000 jobs" would be far more accurate. But we never see that construction from corporate-controlled media outlets.

Companies create jobs. They never destroy them. "Losses" always happen because of regrettable circumstances or outside forces.

The company's hand is always forced. It's never a choice made out of greed (the truth) but because of a plausible excuse.

Re: Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

#243

Post by andsoitis »

rco8786 wrote: post #207
andsoitis wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> These aren't "job losses", these are "firings". While both terms mean someone no longer has a job, they differ in cause and implication. Firing is when employer terminates someone for cause, i.e. employee did something wrong or didn't meet expectations. Job loss is a broader term, simply means the person no longer has a job, for any reason, but typically layoffs, downsizing, restructuring, plant closure, or being f…

"job loss" is purposefully passive to remove culpability from the entity (Amazon) that is making the active choice to terminate these people's jobs. It's the same as language like "officer involved shooting" to avoid saying "an officer shot a person" or calling a "murder" a "loss of life".

> purposefully passive to remove culpability from the entity (Amazon) that is making the active choice to terminate these people's jobs.

Opening line in the article: "Amazon has confirmed it plans to cut thousands of jobs, saying it needs to be "organised more leanly" to seize the opportunity provided by artificial intelligence (AI)."

And the statement from Amazon uses the phrase "we are reducing..."

Re: Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

#244

Post by deaux »

lapcat wrote: post #59

https://www.aboutamazon.com/news/company-news/amazon-workfor... By the way, could Amazon not even bother to proofread a mass layoff announcement? "We’re convicted that we need to be organized more leanly" At least we know this was written by a human, because an LLM probably wouldn't make that mistake. Maybe they fired the proofreaders already.

> because an LLM probably wouldn't make that mistake

To be fair, an Amazon model might, so if they're using those.. /s

Re: Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

#245

Post by rsanek »

qsi wrote: post #223
dgs_sgd wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is downsizing and an employee’s role no longer being cost effective for the business not considered “cause” for firing?

Cause in this context specifically refers to the employee having done something wrong or illegal and means the employee is guilty of misconduct.

It is very rare for someone that is fired to be "guilty of misconduct," unless you consider poor performance misconduct.

Re: Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

#246

Post by reaperducer »

VBprogrammer wrote: post #75
marcusb wrote: post #12

Once a company moves on to recurring, large-scale layoffs justified by vague corporate Mumbo-Jumbo, I think it is safe to assume it is a "day 2" company.

I'm not really sure how this fits with Amazon's corporate culture. I thought all of the dead wood good pip'ed out of there on an ongoing basis. If people are surviving that then who are are the people being ejected? Unprofitable areas or new products which didn't pan out?

I thought all of the dead wood good pip'ed out of there on an ongoing basis.

Local TV says it's because too many people caved in to the return-to-work demand.

Re: Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

#247

Post by javier_e06 »

Oh, and by the way,

you're fired.

Fired?

W-W-What do you mean,

fired?

Um, how else

can I say it?

You're being let go,

your department's

being downsized,

you're part of

an outplacement,

we're going in a

different direction,

we're not picking

up your option...

Take your pick.

I got more.

"The Emperor's new groove"

Re: Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

#248

Post by rco8786 »

andsoitis wrote: post #243
rco8786 wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"job loss" is purposefully passive to remove culpability from the entity (Amazon) that is making the active choice to terminate these people's jobs. It's the same as language like "officer involved shooting" to avoid saying "an officer shot a person" or calling a "murder" a "loss of life".

> purposefully passive to remove culpability from the entity (Amazon) that is making the active choice to terminate these people's jobs. Opening line in the article: "Amazon has confirmed it plans to cut thousands of jobs, saying it needs to be "organised more leanly" to seize the opportunity provided by artificial intelligence (AI). " And the statement from Amazon uses the phrase "we are reducing..."

Yes we’re discussing the headline

Re: Amazon confirms 14,000 job losses in corporate division

#250

Post by qsi »

lexszero_ wrote: post #120
phoe-krk wrote: post #4

These aren't "job losses", these are "firings". They aren't unfortunate accidents of external origin that happened to them, they are conscious internal decisions to let people go.

"Letting go" belongs in the same HR phrasebook. They didn't ask permission to quit and the company were so generous to let them, the initiative was from the other side.

That reads differently to me. The company is doing the letting go. Like letting loose. Or letting fly. It's agency on the part of the company. Letting them see. All of these will have euphemistic overtones as no company will want to say that they axed 10,000 people.
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