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I Got Fired from Amazon as a Software Development Engineer

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Re: I Got Fired from Amazon as a Software Development Engineer

#31

Post by endisneigh »

rkk3 wrote: post #23
endisneigh wrote: post #9

I won’t comment on whether the action is justified or not in this instance, but: Never hang up on a colleague. Ever. As far as social phone etiquette goes that’s probably one of the most egregious things you can do. Instead, humble yourself, politely disagree and document over email, copying another colleague who witnessed, or if unavailable the manager (in this case the skip).

IDK they probably would have been better off if they ended the conversation earlier rather than "giving their manager a piece of their mind" & then hanging up. If a conversation is getting too heated, excusing yourself and taking a beat isn't the worst thing in the world.

I don’t disagree. My read on it was more like they were arguing and the author just abruptly hung up in frustration.

Definitely could be wrong tho

Re: I Got Fired from Amazon as a Software Development Engineer

#33

Post by yaacov »

A lot of my friends work at Amazon. The situation this engineer was thrown into sounds worse than average but I have heard similar stories.

Amazon usually takes 3 months or so to fire people for real or imagined “poor performance”, so this engineer must have said something pretty bad on the call.

Re: I Got Fired from Amazon as a Software Development Engineer

#35

Post by jareklupinski »

Jonovono wrote: post #17
0des wrote: post #7

It's always interesting to see the ratio of green names to normal names in these threads.

What do the green names mean? Never understood

https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented green = new account; orange means YC founders

Re: I Got Fired from Amazon as a Software Development Engineer

#36

Post by poulsbohemian »

cvhashim wrote: post #27
poulsbohemian wrote: post #14

Sounds like the biggest mistake he made was lashing out at a likely in-over-their-head manager. We are only getting one side, but sounds like he was trying to do the right things to either overcome the challenges and/or create boundaries, but he may have been hired to be a sacrificial lamb. In my consulting times, I was brought into something a lot like this for the purpose of being fired so that the CTO could save t…

You see the sacrificial lamb thing with contractors/consultants because they won’t sue for being put in a bad situation and fired afterwards but not sure if it’s too common with Full time engineers. Amazon is just a toxic workplace and I recommend all my fellow engineers avoid that place like the plague. I’ve heard too many horror stories like OPs.

Early on in my career, about year three or so like this guy, I got hired into a similar situation - gig wasn't what the company said. The key was to stay calm and set boundaries at every step. If you let it get emotional, it creates an excuse for management to turn you into the scapegoat. If you instead act like the consummate team player, over communicate, etc, it become hard for anyone to actually fault you. It might be miserable for a while, but the key becomes to start building allies so that you can escape the situation as soon as possible either to a new team or a new gig. Or hope that the team goes through a shakeup soon enough and because you did your thing you are a survivor.

Re: I Got Fired from Amazon as a Software Development Engineer

#37

Post by hackernews777 »

xwowsersx wrote: post #11
hackernews777 wrote: post #4

If you got fired over this it's highly likely you said something pretty bad. The only times I have seen anyone get instafired at Amazon is when they have done something that could be deemed as harassment. (eg. making sexual or racial advancements towards a direct report) Anybody else who gets fired for performance reasons knows they are thin ice for a long time.

what is a racial advancement?

Making some sort of harassment with a racial component that's on par with sexual harassment. Despite all the DEI policies and whatever, the baseline for termination is pretty much the same as most employers, off color remarks are not getting you fired but putting down a fellow employee certainly can.

Re: I Got Fired from Amazon as a Software Development Engineer

#38

Post by sillysaurusx »

Jonovono wrote: post #24
endisneigh wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

New account

ohhh makes sense, thanks. I've been kinda just thinking they were HN admins or like people that have gone through YC

Random fun fact: People who have gone through YC could see fellow YC accounts in orange. It was a neat hidden feature from HN v1. No idea if that's still the case though.

Re: I Got Fired from Amazon as a Software Development Engineer

#39

Post by [deleted] »

ciabattabread wrote: post #28

Wait, so did he get fired, or did he resign? "What an imbalance of power and being an engineer who feels a strong desire to empower other engineers, I reached my limits and wanted out. A few weeks later, a developer on a neighboring team who reported to the same management resigned."

[deleted]

Re: I Got Fired from Amazon as a Software Development Engineer

#40

Post by poulsbohemian »

ciabattabread wrote: post #28

Wait, so did he get fired, or did he resign? "What an imbalance of power and being an engineer who feels a strong desire to empower other engineers, I reached my limits and wanted out. A few weeks later, a developer on a neighboring team who reported to the same management resigned."

I read that as indication that the overall team was imploding, IE: other people were having the same kinds of problems he was experiencing.
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