Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
nytimes.com
Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
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Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
#2I see a lot of comments on the Times regarding unions. We take a lot of things like weekends for granted, and many of these tech companies seem to treat them as a flexible inconvenience.
I wonder if a hundred years from now we will look on the taxes to our mental health today as similarly as we imagine the truly backbreaking labor of the 19th century.
Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
#3I see a lot of comments on the Times regarding unions. We take a lot of things like weekends for granted, and many of these tech companies seem to treat them as a flexible inconvenience. I wonder if a hundred years from now we will look on the taxes to our mental health today as similarly as we imagine the truly backbreaking labor of the 19th century.
The level of stress, and the toll it takes on mental health that we experience today is very low compared to a time when productivity and income were 20x lower.
Our lives have changed, and we are immensely richer than we were 100 or even 50 years ago. People have more mobility, options, and opportunity than ever before in human history. One can argue that certain policies or priorities have affected our lives for the better or worse, but we should not try to compare the relatively minor difficulties we face with those of our forebearers, who left us in a life of luxury.
Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
#4I've worked at a big internet company where the culture was very toxic and not a good place to work, let alone be a normal human being. Pushy, rude and underhanded people were plentiful and were willing to throw you so far under the bus at any given moment that you would never find your way back out.
This became evident to me when I went on my lunch break after working there for about 4 months. Each employee was given 1 hour for lunch. I spent ~15 minutes walking to the local burrito place, grabbed a burrito which took about 10 minutes and then walked back. I was gone roughly 45 minutes.
The next day I was called into my managers office because someone didn't like the amount of time that I spent on my lunch break. Lucky for me I had my receipt and logged my work time so I showed him how much precious company time I spent galavanting to the burrito place.
I said something that I definitely should have. "Maybe the person that reported me should have been doing work instead of worrying about my lunch break. If this company can't treat its employees like humans, I don't plan on working here much longer"
I got written up for insubordination.
I was pissed.
I went back to my desk and typed up my 2 week notice.
Good riddance.
Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
#5I've worked at a big internet company where the culture was very toxic and not a good place to work, let alone be a normal human being. Pushy, rude and underhanded people were plentiful and were willing to throw you so far under the bus at any given moment that you would never find your way back out. This became evident to me when I went on my lunch break after working there for about 4 months. Each employee was give…
What sort of company is that?
Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
#6I've worked at a big internet company where the culture was very toxic and not a good place to work, let alone be a normal human being. Pushy, rude and underhanded people were plentiful and were willing to throw you so far under the bus at any given moment that you would never find your way back out. This became evident to me when I went on my lunch break after working there for about 4 months. Each employee was give…
What sort of company is that?
Even better... Which company?
Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
#7I see a lot of comments on the Times regarding unions. We take a lot of things like weekends for granted, and many of these tech companies seem to treat them as a flexible inconvenience. I wonder if a hundred years from now we will look on the taxes to our mental health today as similarly as we imagine the truly backbreaking labor of the 19th century.
The level of stress, and the toll it takes on mental health that we experience today is very low compared to a time when productivity and income were 20x lower. Our lives have changed, and we are immensely richer than we were 100 or even 50 years ago. People have more mobility, options, and opportunity than ever before in human history. One can argue that certain policies or priorities have affected our lives for the…
Everything you say is true in aggregate, but let’s not forget that the future is still unevenly distributed.
Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
#8I've worked at a big internet company where the culture was very toxic and not a good place to work, let alone be a normal human being. Pushy, rude and underhanded people were plentiful and were willing to throw you so far under the bus at any given moment that you would never find your way back out. This became evident to me when I went on my lunch break after working there for about 4 months. Each employee was give…
How much do you want to bet that "someone" was actually your boss, but they didn't have enough guts to say it themselves? That sounds like a terrible place to work, good on you for leaving.
Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
#9I've worked at a big internet company where the culture was very toxic and not a good place to work, let alone be a normal human being. Pushy, rude and underhanded people were plentiful and were willing to throw you so far under the bus at any given moment that you would never find your way back out. This became evident to me when I went on my lunch break after working there for about 4 months. Each employee was give…
It's odd how similar actions can have drastically different effects. At one particularly bad job (my only bad job?) fresh out of college I had a boss who took a special interest in me and hounded me non-stop. Earnestly trying to address his concerns never seemed to improve the situation...what finally did it was when, after months of prodding, I completely lost my cool and snapped back: "This is bullshit, Larry!"
A pretty similar act of insubordination with drastically different results. My situation improved after that for the remainder of my time in the group.
Re: Jeff Bezos and the Amazon Way
#10I see a lot of comments on the Times regarding unions. We take a lot of things like weekends for granted, and many of these tech companies seem to treat them as a flexible inconvenience. I wonder if a hundred years from now we will look on the taxes to our mental health today as similarly as we imagine the truly backbreaking labor of the 19th century.
It's not just mental health. Working 55-hour weeks (a number many HN users would laugh at) poses a 33% increase in stroke risk and 13% increase of coronary heart disease over "standard" hours: http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/08/19/researchers-link-lo...
We're not just giving up a little time to prove our commitment, we're giving our life. Because our employers will fire us if we don't work long hours, citing a lack of passion or commitment. Just try interviewing for most tech jobs saying up front that you don't want to go over 40 hours. The best part? We punish anyone who doesn't harm themselves in the same way, when we could all be working together to insist on better conditions.