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Amazon Pip Horror Story

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Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#691

Post by deltaonefour »

Manuel_D wrote: post #679
deltaonefour wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think blind does this. But it's mostly like a forum. I don't think there's a review website that specializes in reviewing managers at companies. Reviewers would have to register by company email of course to make sure they're legit. >It got to be thousands of names long, and at least a few of the men didn't deserve to be on it. I think there needs to be a voting process to make sure it's not a smear campaign genera…

And this voting process is assumed to be legitimate? Internet polls are incredibly unreliable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HiTqIyx6tBU

One vote per company email. Similar to how Blind has one account per company email. It is legitimate.

This isn't random people from the internet voting against the manager. It's people in the company who know him, and dislike him.

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#692

Post by frankgrimesjr »

mabbo wrote: post #354

I spent almost a decade at Amazon. Their system for removing low performers has two key flaws. First, the mandatory minimums. If an org is full of superstars, the org still has to ensure it has at least X% turnover per year, so a superstar has to go. Usually well-performing devs whose manager wasn't skilled enough to convince the larger group that all of their people are superstars. It's cruel, unfair, and harms the…

> the org still has to ensure it has at least X% turnover per year

Can anyone explain the motivation for this?

I've never understood why a company would want to routinely fire X% of otherwise well preforming employees in a team, when they're going to need to hire that many again anyway.

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#693

Post by greedo »

transitory_pce wrote: post #6

This is a phenomenon common to all low grade/incompetent dev managers: When a dev asks for a team change they view it as a slap in the face because it has happened to them so often in the past and they take it as a personal offence. The fact is they are lousy managers and usually incompetent and nobody wants to work in their team. So they go on the offensive and try to manage the dev out before senior management real…

I had a boss who lost a new hire to another team. This new hire was an outstanding performer, and the boss simply couldn't see what he had done to cause this. He seriously was in a funk about it for 6 months. Anytime it came up, he went through the stages of grief. Turns out the employee simply didn't like the caliber of teammates, nor the pace of work. He was able to move to a team that tended towards more of a cowboy mentality.

The same manager never fired anyone he hired. He fired a few that he had inherited (even calling them 'deadwood') around other employees. Employees who had worked with the 'deadwood' for decades. But his hires? They could be the worst performers, and even though they were contract to hire, he always hired them. To not hire them would be to admit his hiring practices were crappy. And considering he had little technical knowledge, he was susceptible to hiring people who kissed the ring (and stroked the ego).

Some managers are just bad. Peter Principal and all that. Some are great at telling everyone what they want to hear, both up the chain and down.

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#694

Post by raz32dust »

deltaonefour wrote: post #647
raz32dust wrote: post #630

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that will be extremely unfair to the manager who is just acting on stupid company policies. Managers have a very difficult job of walking a tight rope. Why single out one person and ruin their career?

So firing someone for trying to switch teams is company policy? I doubt it. Many managers are ass holes because that's the definition of their personality. I feel ass holes should definitely be singled out so that they can't be managers again for the future.

(1) If the manager did PIP purely as a way to prevent team transfer, then yes I agree that it is clear bad behavior that should be punished. But I am not sure if that is the case. Say this guy was the lowest performer in the manager's team and was on track to being PIPed anyway. Should the manager now be forced to PIP someone else just because this guy is moving to another team?

(2) There are way too many PIP horror stories from Amazon. It is evident that managers even hire people just to PIP them later. In that kind of environment, such bad behavior is encouraged and normalized. Then this particular manager might not be significantly worse than any other person put in a similar position. If the culture is to blame, then scapegoating one manager will just deflect the blame.

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#695

Post by greedo »

0x002A wrote: post #554
square_usual wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TFA mentions a PIP quota and implies that OP was used to fill the quota, so I'm pretty sure upper management won't blink at this happening. They expect people to get PIP'd, and they have no visibility on the actual internals, so to them OP is just as good as anybody else who got PIP'd.

The upper management only gives a blink when it becomes more known by the public. They don't want to hear (just not to be in the responsibility zone) and when it's widely known they would go whitewashing or PR stunts. Why they had to invent "to be the best employer of the world" as a leadership principle? The more people should stand up and make the stupid policies known, that's the only way this can stop. Otherwise…

Upper mgmt generally doesn't give a shit about what the public knows. Amazon is famous for employees pissing in bottles because they don't get enough breaks. No one cares enough to make the warehouse conditions humane. They just do enough PR to feel good about it. The job still sucks, and the pay still sucks.

The only thing that management cares about is how much they're paid, and how much power they have. Look at how Elon Musk behaves. He gets mad/irritated when told by regulators that he can't exercise the power he feels is his right. I actually don't think he gives a hoot about how much money he has, except as a tool for accomplishing what he wants.

Others are more into the wallet than the ego. Do you think Zuckerberg gives a crap about what privacy advocates think? Most people have a fair idea of how far FB spies on them, and Zuck knows they don't care as long as they can share cat pictures with their friends, or post Let's Go Brandon stuff. But you can bet that he's supremely pissed about losing so much money due to Apple's privacy changes.

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#696

Post by mabbo »

frankgrimesjr wrote: post #692
mabbo wrote: post #354

I spent almost a decade at Amazon. Their system for removing low performers has two key flaws. First, the mandatory minimums. If an org is full of superstars, the org still has to ensure it has at least X% turnover per year, so a superstar has to go. Usually well-performing devs whose manager wasn't skilled enough to convince the larger group that all of their people are superstars. It's cruel, unfair, and harms the…

> the org still has to ensure it has at least X% turnover per year Can anyone explain the motivation for this? I've never understood why a company would want to routinely fire X% of otherwise well preforming employees in a team, when they're going to need to hire that many again anyway.

The system presumes that leaders are lying or too weak. That in an org of 200 people, there must be some bad ones, and by culling them the average skill level goes up.

Nevermind the concept of growing your people. We'll just hope they grow on their own and replace them if they can't.

Every team is already understaffed anyways.

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#697

Post by greedo »

ctvo wrote: post #361
tasha0663 wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

^ found the boss of the guy in the post

Never been a manager in my life. I think the biggest problem most engineers have is not understanding how the systems around them interact re: company and management. Know the rules of the game you're playing deeply or you'll keep losing.

Sociopaths, the Clueless, and the Losers...

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#698

Post by [deleted] »

allochthon wrote: post #604
mistyislands wrote: post #572

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also an Amazon tech manager. I confirm that this is also my experience. Managers don't like to put people into Focus or Pivot (unless the employee is absolutely terrible, which is rare). But we all have URA quotas to fill, mandated by HR. This is absolutely terrible for team cohesion and morale; while also being the largest source of friction and inefficiency.

I'm curious why these practices continue despite what seem to be obvious deficiencies.

[deleted]

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#699

Post by [deleted] »

wpietri wrote: post #413
RHSeeger wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a manager, you get verbal (never written) lashings from your manager and skip manager to put the lowest performers on performance plans that ensure that any attrition counts. As soon as you capitulate, your lowest performer is now considered a low performer. Clearly, I'm preaching to the choir here, but... I am constantly amazed at companies that do this. Effectively, they're incentivizing their workers to sabot…

Totally. For a company that lives and dies by statistics in its business and technical decisions, it amazes me that they can act like employee performance on a two-pizza team is normally distributed and only about the team member. Sometimes a poorly performing team member was just a bad hiring choice. You politely let them go and work to improve your hiring process. Sometimes the person is struggling for reasons outs…

[deleted]

Re: Amazon Pip Horror Story

#700

Post by greedo »

psd1 wrote: post #165
winrid wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is the manager would probably start with "did you have a pizza stolen?" without mentioning HR

The stolen item needs to slightly vary in each telling. Catch a mole 101.

They'll have to call it the "Pizza Trap" instead of the Canary Trap...
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