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I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

benadam.me

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Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#481

Post by bumby »

darth_avocado wrote: post #478
mikesabbagh wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why do you want to work for Amazon and Google when there are so many great companies that would appreciate you every day (and pay you more)

No. There are companies where you can have a life, but they are boring. And there are companies that pay you more, but there’s always a catch. In my long resume consisting of Startups to SV Giants, not one company paid you a lot to do less work.

I’ve heard it described as: “You can work on interesting problems, have a great work-life balance, or get paid really well, but you can only select two.”

Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#482

Post by dragonwriter »

rossjudson wrote: post #476
cjaro wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Performance Improvement Plan. It's basically the company's way of saying "We want to fire you, but don't have a reason on the books, so here you go. In six months, pack your bags and go."

It's all perspective, and this simplification isn't accurate. It's "I don't want to fire you, but you need to fix these things. Let's put this in the books so there's no disagreement over whether you're aware, and what you need to do." In most cases at-will employment means the employer/manager can fire a person, so if that was the only thing going on, it would already be done.

> In most cases at-will employment means the employer/manager can fire a person

For anyone who is a member of at least one protected class (which everyone who has any [or where this is possible, no] race, sex, ethnicity, religion, or national origin unambiguously is for each that apply, and there's some others that are less universal, and that's just under federal law) there is always a risk that that they will file a claim to have been dismissed for that reason, and under the civil preponderance of the evidence standard, if they have any substantial evidence indicating that might be the case the employer needs to overcome it with superior evidence that it is not.

And that is what a PIP is for, to provide the evidence trail supporting that alternative reason. They also serve as notice to people to get out before they are fired, which (unless bungled bad enough to support a constructive termination claim) also avoids wrongful termination liability, because the departure is voluntary. PIPs have nothing to do with performance improvement and everything to do with liability containment.

For actual performance problems that the employer wants to resolve, regular performance reviews and informal counseling that occurs before a PIP is the means to address it.

Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#483

Post by libria »

masterof0 wrote: post #17

Ex-Amazonian here, I agree with almost everything OP say. I have a few things to add in case HR is reading this: - RSUs vesting schedule sucks, fix it.(5% - first year, 15% - second , then 5% each quarter, i think...) - Internal tooling is pretty bad (frameworks, pipelines, ....) and the documentation is non-existent, and when it exists , is not very helpful. - Amazon has the least amount of holidays of all FAANG, wh…

> 5% - first year, 15% - second , then 5% each quarter, i think...

It's 5%, 15%, 40%, 40%.

In lieu of RSU's in Year 1, you get a big signing bonus. Year 2, not quite as big signing bonus (hence the +10% RSU). Year 3 and 4, nothing but RSU.

It adds up to the same amount every year assuming no stock growth.

Are you saying you just want double your salary for year 1 and 2 and are planning to quit before year 3 when it drops to nil? Yeah, who wouldn't?

I wouldn't want to be a shareholder of any company dumb enough to offer this.

Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#484

Post by [deleted] »

darth_avocado wrote: post #478
mikesabbagh wrote: post #467

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why do you want to work for Amazon and Google when there are so many great companies that would appreciate you every day (and pay you more)

No. There are companies where you can have a life, but they are boring. And there are companies that pay you more, but there’s always a catch. In my long resume consisting of Startups to SV Giants, not one company paid you a lot to do less work.

[deleted]

Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#485

Post by Retric »

bumby wrote: post #481
darth_avocado wrote: post #478

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. There are companies where you can have a life, but they are boring. And there are companies that pay you more, but there’s always a catch. In my long resume consisting of Startups to SV Giants, not one company paid you a lot to do less work.

I’ve heard it described as: “You can work on interesting problems, have a great work-life balance, or get paid really well, but you can only select two.”

The consultant side can do all three, but it’s a tough balancing act. You need the right niche, the right connections, great technical skills, and great social skills.

Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#486

Post by ignoramous »

robby_w_g wrote: post #125
sharkweek wrote: post #25

Hey congrats on making it 10 months! "Urgent to not block progress, but also ironic that they are asking a person who has no clue what they are doing to deliver critical work" Friend of mine started a role there (this was 4-5 years ago) and was fired (sorry... more or less asked to leave, being told he could keep his signing bonus if he just left) within about six weeks because he wasn't immediately delivering on som…

> I bag on Amazon a lot on here (which if I were to review with my therapist is likely because I had an absolutely HORRENDOUS experience in an interview loop with them my first step out of college that still makes me nervous in interviews, even 15 years later). Hey, I had a similar experience with Google! It was my first technical interview for my first job out of college. The interviewer laughed at my code, and then…

> ...an ego-driven hazing ritual.

Google India (c. late 2000s / early 2010s) used to be notorious for this, so much so that Googlers I knew would rather have their referrals give interviews at Google HQ (MTV), instead (not that it was any better, but rather it wasn't as worse).

One piece of advice I received early on was, interviews aren't meant to be a pissing contest but often are. As an interviewee, accept that and try not to take rejections personally (easier said than done). As an interviewer, know that you're in a position of power, and try not to abuse it (easily done but never said).

Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#487

Post by khazhoux »

Dig1t wrote: post #425
robby_w_g wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I bag on Amazon a lot on here (which if I were to review with my therapist is likely because I had an absolutely HORRENDOUS experience in an interview loop with them my first step out of college that still makes me nervous in interviews, even 15 years later). Hey, I had a similar experience with Google! It was my first technical interview for my first job out of college. The interviewer laughed at my code, and then…

Just in general this is extremely rude to do as an interviewer. I remember interviewing at Google a few years ago and the interviewer laughed at me when I asked her if they used Kotlin in the mobile app that they were hiring for. Kotlin was pretty standard at the time in most 3rd party apps and nowadays Google never shuts up about it in their dev talks, but back then I guess it was so unlikely that Google itself woul…

> It came across as pretty rude in that interview setting, though she probably was not intending to be so.

Right, probably wasn't meant to be rude. Not hard to imagine that she might have had a lunch conversation recently about Kotlin, or just finished reading a long HN thread about it, and that was the laughter.

But in general, yeah, we all need to be mindful in our language. The interviewer is under zero stress/tension during an interview, while the interviewee is on high alert.

Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#488

Post by sbierwagen »

itsdrewmiller wrote: post #46
Waterluvian wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Formatting is a very very distant minor gripe compared to what I think is the main reason this is a problem: versioning. That being said, if it works, it works. If it doesn't work, make a case for why and develop a _holistic_ understanding of the costs and benefits of changing the current process. Maybe you can change it, or maybe you learn why it doesn't change. If it works, but it offends your sensibilities, perhap…

Excel has versioning now! But it doesn’t work when people email around hard copies instead of links to the shared file, which they still constantly do. >:-O

>instead of links to the shared file

So you mean Excel 365, not desktop Excel?

Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#489

Post by kemitche »

iends wrote: post #399
pjbeam wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a built in assumption of stock growth in the grant they give you, and after year 2 the bonus dries up so it's your base of 160 + whatever the equity is. Year 2 -> 3 comp drop is not uncommon.

Amazon also has this weird 5%, 15%, 40% & 40% vesting schedule. This tells me most people are not making it past 2 years.

The early years are generally accompanied by huge cash bonuses so it evens out against the back loaded equity.

Re: I took a job at Amazon, only to leave after 10 months

#490

Post by khazhoux »

reaperducer wrote: post #350
autokad wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "My biggest gripe is that Leetcode is systematically favoring candidates who have months of free time to memorize arbitrary logic puzzles. It makes me sad for the less privileged candidates who might be working a job while also trying to break into the IT field." I told google that this style of interviewing is discriminatory, especially towards people with families, or other commitments. Never got another call for…

I told one that I am a human being, not a circus animal here to do tricks, and if they want me to do live coding, they'd have to pay me for my time. Same result as you: The recruiters stopped bothering me.

I'm not a huge fan of coding tests, but as a hiring manager, we do them during my team's interviews.

I'm not looking for a leetcoder. But I've had to reject candidates who otherwise seemed really strong, but then it turns out that they completely struggled with every aspect of a simple python question.

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