Amazon Work Culture

[Black Heart]

I've heard stories from people that worked at Amazon in Seattle years ago. Bringing the "give it all" to the company in the digital age. Crying at desks seems over the top. Can these people get a life? A good way to live?


SEATTLE — On Monday mornings, fresh recruits line up for an orientation intended to catapult them into Amazon’s singular way of working.

They are told to forget the “poor habits” they learned at previous jobs, one employee recalled. When they “hit the wall” from the unrelenting pace, there is only one solution: “Climb the wall,” others reported. To be the best Amazonians they can be, they should be guided by the leadership principles, 14 rules inscribed on handy laminated cards. When quizzed days later, those with perfect scores earn a virtual award proclaiming, “I’m Peculiar” — the company’s proud phrase for overturning workplace conventions.


At Amazon, workers are encouraged to tear apart one another’s ideas in meetings, toil long and late (emails arrive past midnight, followed by text messages asking why they were not answered), and held to standards that the company boasts are “unreasonably high.” The internal phone directory instructs colleagues on how to send secret feedback to one another’s bosses. Employees say it is frequently used to sabotage others. (The tool offers sample texts, including this: “I felt concerned about his inflexibility and openly complaining about minor tasks.”)

Amazon is building new offices in Seattle and, in about three years, will have enough space for about 50,000 employees. Credit Ruth Fremson/The New York Times
Many of the newcomers filing in on Mondays may not be there in a few years. The company’s winners dream up innovations that they roll out to a quarter-billion customers and accrue small fortunes in soaring stock. Losers leave or are fired in annual cullings of the staff — “purposeful Darwinism,” one former Amazon human resources director said. Some workers who suffered from cancer, miscarriages and other personal crises said they had been evaluated unfairly or edged out rather than given time to recover.

Even as the company tests delivery by drone and ways to restock toilet paper at the push of a bathroom button, it is conducting a little-known experiment in how far it can push white-collar workers, redrawing the boundaries of what is acceptable. The company, founded and still run by Jeff Bezos, rejects many of the popular management bromides that other corporations at least pay lip service to and has instead designed what many workers call an intricate machine propelling them to achieve Mr. Bezos’ ever-expanding ambitions.

“This is a company that strives to do really big, innovative, groundbreaking things, and those things aren’t easy,” said Susan Harker, Amazon’s top recruiter. “When you’re shooting for the moon, the nature of the work is really challenging. For some people it doesn’t work.”


“Nearly every person I worked with, I saw cry at their desk.”

Bo Olson, worked in books marketing

Bo Olson was one of them. He lasted less than two years in a book marketing role and said that his enduring image was watching people weep in the office, a sight other workers described as well. “You walk out of a conference room and you’ll see a grown man covering his face,” he said. “Nearly every person I worked with, I saw cry at their desk.”

Thanks in part to its ability to extract the most from employees, Amazon is stronger than ever. Its swelling campus is transforming a swath of this city, a 10-million-square-foot bet that tens of thousands of new workers will be able to sell everything to everyone everywhere. Last month, it eclipsed Walmart as the most valuable retailer in the country, with a market valuation of $250 billion, and Forbes deemed Mr. Bezos the fifth-wealthiest person on earth.

Tens of millions of Americans know Amazon as customers, but life inside its corporate offices is largely a mystery. Secrecy is required; even low-level employees sign a lengthy confidentiality agreement. The company authorized only a handful of senior managers to talk to reporters for this article, declining requests for interviews with Mr. Bezos and his top leaders.

However, more than 100 current and former Amazonians — members of the leadership team, human resources executives, marketers, retail specialists and engineers who worked on projects from the Kindle to grocery delivery to the recent mobile phone launch — described how they tried to reconcile the sometimes-punishing aspects of their workplace with what many called its thrilling power to create.

In interviews, some said they thrived at Amazon precisely because it pushed them past what they thought were their limits. Many employees are motivated by “thinking big and knowing that we haven’t scratched the surface on what’s out there to invent,” said Elisabeth Rommel, a retail executive who was one of those permitted to speak.

Others who cycled in and out of the company said that what they learned in their brief stints helped their careers take off. And more than a few who fled said they later realized they had become addicted to Amazon’s way of working.

“A lot of people who work there feel this tension: It’s the greatest place I hate to work,” said John Rossman, a former executive there who published a book, “The Amazon Way.”


“It would certainly be much easier and socially cohesive to just compromise and not debate, but that may lead to the wrong decision.”

Tony Galbato, Amazon vice president for human resources
Amazon may be singular but perhaps not quite as peculiar as it claims. It has just been quicker in responding to changes that the rest of the work world is now experiencing: data that allows individual performance to be measured continuously, come-and-go relationships between employers and employees, and global competition in which empires rise and fall overnight. Amazon is in the vanguard of where technology wants to take the modern office: more nimble and more productive, but harsher and less forgiving.

“Organizations are turning up the dial, pushing their teams to do more for less money, either to keep up with the competition or just stay ahead of the executioner’s blade,” said Clay Parker Jones, a consultant who helps old-line businesses become more responsive to change.

On a recent morning, as Amazon’s new hires waited to begin orientation, few of them seemed to appreciate the experiment in which they had enrolled. Only one, Keith Ketzle, a freckled Texan triathlete with an M.B.A., lit up with recognition, explaining how he left his old, lumbering company for a faster, grittier one.

“Conflict brings about innovation,” he said.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/te...lace.html?_r=0

[harrybarracuda]

Sounds like a barrel of laughs.

[Latindancer]

I think that a lot more companies are going to follow suit, in order to extract more work from employees. Bunnings (a hardware chain in Australia)

has a culture like this, to a far, far lesser extent. I was going to work for them once, but got knifed in the back before I even started !

[Iceman123]

I think that a lot more companies are going to follow suit, in order to extract more work from employees. Bunnings (a hardware chain in Australia)

has a culture like this, to a far, far lesser extent. I was going to work for them once, but got knifed in the back before I even started !

FFS Please, Comparing Bunnings to Amazon! Are you having a laugh?

You do not need the job at Bunnings you are a friggin comedian!

[CaptainNemo]

The good old days are coming back, then.

[Latindancer]

Well, I did say "to a far, far lesser extent".

[Iceman123]

^
Was just having a laugh LD?
What went wrong in life that you considered Bunnings as an employer?

Whereabouts in Oz are you?

[VocalNeal]

workers are encouraged to tear apart one another’s ideas in meetings

Seems it would be better to support the good ideas. This all seems to smack at negativity and ridicule, so that no new ideas are forthcoming

[baldrick]

text messages asking why they were not answered)

they should post the numbers on 4chan and sit back and laugh

[Latindancer]

^
Was just having a laugh LD?
What went wrong in life that you considered Bunnings as an employer?

Whereabouts in Oz are you?

I'm in Brisbane. You're in Adelaide, aren't you ?

What went wrong ? The Global Financial Crisis, and being USED by a "financial advisor".
Oh, Bunnings wouldn't be too bad if it didn't have such a wankerish internal "culture". Still, Amazon leaves it for dead...

[Passing Through]

its thrilling power to create

Jesus fucking Christ. Finding new ways to sell worthless junk to obese fuckheads who are too lazy to get off their sclerotic fucking arses and walk to a real shop does not make you some kind latter-day Michelangelo.

those with perfect scores earn a virtual award proclaiming, “I’m Peculiar”

'I'm a cvnt' would surely be more accurate.

[Exit Strategy]

You want a job or you don't want a job? German trade unions tried to fuck with Amazon but Amazon fucked them up. Fokin euros. They attack Google as well and who do you use, hey, you use google or you you use european union. Yeah I thought so.

[Boon Mee]

You want a job or you don't want a job? German trade unions tried to fuck with Amazon but Amazon fucked them up. Fokin euros. They attack Google as well and who do you use, hey, you use google or you you use european union. Yeah I thought so.

These Nanny Staters are in for a rude awakening as oil revenues continue to slide.

$15.00 per hour wages for flipping burgers as well are driving the Robot push.

[Passing Through]

German trade unions tried to fuck with Amazon but Amazon fucked them up.

Nobody fucks with Amazon, right? They're the fucking Rocky Balboa of online shit-merchants.

[bsnub]

You want a job or you don't want a job? German trade unions tried to fuck with Amazon but Amazon fucked them up. Fokin euros. They attack Google as well and who do you use, hey, you use google or you you use european union. Yeah I thought so.

You really are retarded aren't you?

[Boon Mee]

You want a job or you don't want a job? German trade unions tried to fuck with Amazon but Amazon fucked them up. Fokin euros. They attack Google as well and who do you use, hey, you use google or you you use european union. Yeah I thought so.

You really are retarded aren't you?

That's all you got?

[bsnub]

^ I got plenty more. I worked for Amazon for a number of years. It is the walmart of tech jobs nobody who is worth their salt stays there for long. It is a springboard and nothing more. Jeff Bezos is a total loon and it shows in the culture that he has created.

With regards to Exit strategy and his obviously limited IQ I would guess that it is just another Socal multi. Just like these two mystery posters that just all of the sudden showed up. I am guessing that either LTNPEE or attaboy is behind them. You are clearly not behind them because you are only capable of posting one or two sentences in your own words.

[Davis Knowlton]

Don't know/care much about Amazon, but their customer service is regularly the best I have ever experienced from a major company.

[Boon Mee]

Don't know/care much about Amazon, but their customer service is regularly the best I have ever experienced from a major company.

Agree, although their prices for Kindle books is a bit steep IMO.

[spliff]

evil-corp?

[Davis Knowlton]

[quote=Boon Mee;3080923]

Agree, although their prices for Kindle books is a bit steep IMO.

True. But no postage and instant delivery eases the pain a bit.

[Boon Mee]

[QUOTE=Davis Knowlton;3080931]

Agree, although their prices for Kindle books is a bit steep IMO.

True. But no postage and instant delivery eases the pain a bit.

Yeah, I like that bit. Plus, the reviews they do on the web site gives a good heads-up as to whether or not the book is worth the money.

[thaimeme]

Don't know/care much about Amazon, but their customer service is regularly the best I have ever experienced from a major company.

Makes sense, as their micro-economy is base purely on consumption and repeated consumption, one would consider that their service policies might be customer friendly.

[Boon Mee]

Don't know/care much about Amazon, but their customer service is regularly the best I have ever experienced from a major company.

Makes sense, as their micro-economy is base purely on consumption and repeated consumption, one would consider that their service policies might be customer friendly.

It's called good old fashioned Capitolism which disturbs the Socialists to no end. They reckon every employee working at Amazon or Wal Mart should be on at least a $15.00 an hour rate.

[Black Heart]

[QUOTE=Boon Mee;3080935]

Agree, although their prices for Kindle books is a bit steep IMO.

True. But no postage and instant delivery eases the pain a bit.

Yeah, I like that bit. Plus, the reviews they do on the web site gives a good heads-up as to whether or not the book is worth the money.

Yes, definitely.

I can read so many reviews about a book from a regular reader that I can sometimes feel like I've actually read the books.

I still order from Amazon when I want a book about 50-60% of the time.

Yes, I want to support local bookstores but Amazon is so easy. The cost is usually the same and often a little cheaper.