8 ms·

Jeff Bezos Says Amazon Won’t Tolerate ‘Callous’ Management Practices

175 points by ennuihenry 11y ago

tajen 11y ago
Jeff Bezos encourages employees a "careful read" of the NYT article and the read of "a very different take by a current Amazonian" on LinkedIn. What I see is a company with a big PR department who hasn't succeeded to spin positive stories about their HR in newspapers. We'll see in the next months whether they prop up their game. Besides, if you face a difficulty with your work environment, don't talk to HR™. They are paid to exclude any PR hazard from the company. NB: Moderator/dang, please merge with https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10072753 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10072753
seibelj 11y ago
I've been reading various comments about this around the internet and many people are saying they will stop ordering from Amazon because of it. These white collar workers are highly paid, and not forced to be there. Most of them could easily find another job someplace else (and it sounds like many do). I just can't feel bad for them. If you don't want to work throughout your vacation, go find another job that won't make you work through your vacation. This isn't North Korea, Bezos isn't going to throw you in a reeducation camp. I will keep ordering from Amazon because they provide the best service. Simple as that.
- leftnode 11y ago
  Unless you're on a visa and having a job is a requirement of keeping said visa.
  - seibelj 11y ago
    That is the same situation at any company with H1B's, and I didn't see anything in the article that mentioned abuse of those workers specifically.
    - wtetzner 11y ago
      The point is it's not so easy to leave in that situation.
  - ClayM 11y ago
    or if you work in one of the warehouses
- supercanuck 11y ago
  Honestly, I would need to see white collar women shackled to computers in dilapidated warehouses on 60 minutes before I had to give up 2 Day Shipping, and even then I'd probably convince myself that the exposure means change is happening and start using again
  - knightofmars 11y ago
    To those who have down voted this comment, you down vote this comment for being distasteful without recognizing the reality and honesty its perspective provides.
- comrh 11y ago
  I just think they shouldn't act like such jerks and treat employees like human beings who are on your team. Sure they have the ability to leave, I'm just trying to support better behavior though.
- amirmc 11y ago
  That reasoning could also be applied to anyone who's suffering in an abusive relationship (whether emotional or physical). It would be inappropriate then, just as it's inappropriate here. In addition, not everything has to be decided solely by where one spends their money. It's entirely possible to put pressure on an organisation through other means.
  - seibelj 11y ago
    This isn't a man who is beating his wife. The employee doesn't have the social pressure to stay with someone they married rather than face the shame of divorce. The employee doesn't have a part of them that is literally in love with the abuser (a company). It's a stretch to use the 'abused spouse' argument with highly educated knowledge workers making 6 figure salaries. Find a new job.
    - nilkn 11y ago
      > The employee doesn't have the social pressure to stay with someone they married rather than face the shame of divorce. Actually, workplaces like this tend to thrive on social pressure and psychological manipulation. The NYT article paints a picture in which people begin undergoing brainwashing on day one. A workplace can most definitely create a very powerful culture of internal shaming. That said, leaving an abusive relationship is still likely to be harder, for a few reasons. First, there's true love involved -- no employee was ever truly in love with Amazon. Second, there are logistical reasons -- it's probably easier to quit Amazon and find another job than it is for many people to leave an abusive relationship and get back on their own independent feet. But I think it's still dangerous to underestimate the social pressures that a large corporation can create.
- zamalek 11y ago
  I'm not advocating or rejecting the Amazon boycott, simply here to challenge the way you think: while everything you said is logical you can't simply treat people like trash, it doesn't matter if they are white collar, gold collar or can't-afford-a-collar. A situation that shares many similarities is: "it is that woman's fault that she does not leave her abusive husband." That is laying blame on the person who was abused (not matter their background) instead of the person dealing out the injustice. Imagine that Bezos had not disowned this behavior: more and more would follow suit and eventually you'd be hard-pressed to find a place where this isn't the norm. For example: stack ranking had to start somewhere. Now you'll find it at many places and it's no longer as simple as "just go work somewhere else." If you've acquired a lifestyle where you depend on a corporate job with a cushy salary, what are you going to do? Don't forget that people can (and do) undervalue themselves. Maybe they don't believe that they could find another job: possibly because their manager has completely destroyed their self-worth. Finally, it's just fucking stupid. It's actually counter-productive. It's been shown over and over again (one example[1]) that the way you get better results out of humans is to treat them humanely and, unbelievably, make them want to work for you instead of work for you out of fear. Practices like this, stack ranking, etc. all originate out of the industrial age when machines were the primary concern - you can't manage humans like machines: they will revolt (consciously or subconsciously). [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc
  - XorNot 11y ago
    Even if you haven't acquired a lifestyle. It's not like things get better when management adopts some new terrible practice for non-salaried employees. By and large they live day to day stack-ranking all sorts of far more abusive BS.
  - beachstartup 11y ago
    > A situation that shares many similarities is: "it is that woman's fault that she does not leave her abusive husband." oh please. this isn't reddit, HN is full of grown adults with jobs and relationships that live in the real world. women have full agency in 2015 and to claim they don't is so insulting and sexist i don't even know where to begin. same with white collar professionals. i don't condone what amazon does but it's your own damn fault if you decide to stay, and same with individuals MALE OR FEMALE in abusive relationships, and believe you me there are plenty of males in horrendous relationships - physically, mentally, and emotionally abused by their wives or girlfriends.
- atopuzov 11y ago
  Some people signed the contract thinking it's a decent place to work but found out later it's not. They received relocation bonus (which they have to return if they leave within 2 years), left their previous job, are now in a country where there visa depends on being employed by Amazon so things are not as black and white as you would like to represent them and they just can't leave as easily as some. It's not slavery, but it's not far from indentured servitude. P.S. I'm not in that situation but have a few colleagues who are, and going back to Ukraine for them is not an option.
- andersonmvd 11y ago
  It's not just a matter of whether it looks like North Korea or not, it's a matter of what kind of companies you want to see out there. You may approve it or not, and you can respond to it. One way to respond is to stop ordering from Amazon.
- drzaiusapelord 11y ago
  >Most of them could easily find another job someplace else Not too long ago we laughed at open offices and tiny cubes with half or quarter height walls as just desserts for low wage workers like call center operators. After all, if they wanted better conditions they should make themselves more marketable. Now coders are having to deal with these punishing layouts due to them being a current executive fad. Now every executive at every company is buying into this "treat them like shit" philosophy. Between this and H1B visa abuse, where exactly do domestic workers flee to? You can work for company X with a crappy culture or company Y with a crappy culture. Illusion of choice isn't choice.
  - inversionOf 11y ago
    Terrible working conditions have been the norm for many coders for as long as there has been coding. In the late 90s, Joel Spolsky rose by being a contrarian and advocating good work conditions. Microsoft was always held as an extreme outlier with its good conditions. Everyone was agape about the .com bubble because companies were giving employees nice chairs (which in retrospect seems absurd...something so minor as a signal of excess). The point, I suppose, is that our own information funnels often mislead us into trends and "averages", when it's just cycles.
    - drzaiusapelord 11y ago
      Maybe, but I'm probably a lot older than your average HN'er and I remember my first few jobs. Everyone had an office. The sysadmin had one, the developers each had one, the manager did, etc. Or at the very least had a proper full size cube with proper size walls. There was an emphasis of privacy and quiet time because everyone needed to concentrate to get shit done. Walking into IT was like walking into a library. 10+ years ago was the last time I saw IT staff in offices outside of management or even a proper full sized, full walled cube.
      - hga 11y ago
        Indeed, I myself started working in 1980 and it sure seems like it was better then, but I can't isolate that from working in the Boston area until its high tech scene finished dying a hard death in the early '90s (the web created a new one a little later) and I moved to the D.C. area which you might say didn't have as high standards.
- nilkn 11y ago
  I really do not think that someone being well-paid is justification for treating them poorly. Surely an employee should just be treated well, period. I actually think your line of thinking here is incredibly dangerous -- you seem to think that if someone is well-paid it's okay to treat them like dirt, as if you have to balance things out somehow. And regardless of how well-paid any of them may or may not be (keep in mind these are not just the developers), they all might have made real sacrifices in their lives to work for Amazon without realizing what they were getting into. Quitting a beloved former job for what appeared to be a much needed pay raise, moving cross country with your family, etc... I'm not boycotting anything but everyone has a right to be upset when they're mistreated.
- a_c_s 11y ago
  Workers, white-collar or not, are seldom sold a job with full information: working through vacation isn't the kind of thing mentioned in job postings. I don't think anyone should be forced to work through their vacation: that's why it is called vacation. If you don't want people to take vacation then don't offer it, but offering vacation "in name only" is the worst of all possible worlds. I want to live in a world where companies treat their workers well and therefore I don't want to patronize companies that willfully and systemically dehumanize them.
- Rainymood 11y ago
  >I will keep ordering from Amazon because they provide the best service. Simple as that. I will keep buying from clothes from Primark because they provide the cheapest. Simple as that. ...
- aikah 11y ago
  > I've been reading various comments about this around the internet and many people are saying they will stop ordering from Amazon because of it. Well it's because the people who are Amazon customers can relate these white collars being "harassed" at Amazon. It's because of a lot of these customers might have lived the same situation and know how horrible this is.
- netcan 11y ago
  Implied in your comment is that employees (assuming they are employable white collar employees) are empowered economic actors. They keep choosing to work there. I think the reality of the employee-employer relationship is that employees don't have the sort of power, as one would have as a customer, for example. Part of the reasons are probably explainable economically. It's a fairly illiquid market for employees because the cost of getting to an agreement, negotiating terms (never-mind sampling) is very high. A lot of other reasons are probably best explained psychologically or anthropologically, roles we assume in certain situations. I suspect these are the bigger ones. Either way, barriers are there and bad treatment of employees often results in badly treated employees, not empty just resignations. In a lot of ways, "if you don't like it, get another job" like "if you don't like it, get another country." The free exchange economistic-ey forces are there, but they are not the only things there. Other things that make employers behave better is standards set by society. These are laws, but also just norms and practices. These are impacted by things like articles or consumer responses. It's complicated. I'm fairly sympathetic to a lot of libertarian positions. But, I don't buy into the strong economic rationalist arguments. Economic forces dictate how some things play out. other times, other cultural forces take effect. When it comes to employee treatment, I think societal norms are a massive influence. The reaction you are observing is part a mechanism for this. Society's scolding amazon for treating its employees badly, defining and enforcing the nom..
  - chaostheory 11y ago
    > In a lot of ways, "if you don't like it, get another job" like "if you don't like it, get another country." There are big differences between the two unless you live in a state that borders Canada. In most cases, getting a new job does not require you to relocate far away or significantly change your lifestyle. > It's a fairly illiquid market for employees because the cost of getting to an agreement, negotiating terms (never-mind sampling) is very high. Is this cost higher than staying miserable? About the only thing I can think of for being forced to stay employed with Amazon is to complete the "two year tour of duty" for your resume. I'd agree with you more if we were discussing uneducated and unskilled workers. However unless I missed something I feel that we were talking about skilled and educated workers that are in demand by many companies. That said I'm not condoning any company that has bad practices and I'm still sympathetic to anyone that gets poorly treated at any company, while at the same time I feel that staying with a company that makes you unhappy as an highly in demand worker is a conscious choice you make as an adult. I don't feel that most people have work contracts. Employment is at will for both the employer and employee.
- pdabbadabba 11y ago
  I don't plan to boycott either, but I can see why others do. Whether Amazon's employees are white collar or not, and whether or not they freely choose to work there, I still find it morally objectionable for Amazon to treat their employees the way that they apparently do. Of course this is not as bad as taking advantage of desperate, low-skill workers, or taking advantage of lax labor standards abroad. But white-collar Amazon workers are still people and the managers at Amazon still owe them at least some duty to not willfully make their lives miserable. (And, by the way, there are also stories out there about Amazon's treatment of lower-skilled, less "free" warehouse employees, etc. which would, I think, be better cause for boycott if true. But that's really a different subject.)
- cowardlydragon 11y ago
  I will keep ordering from McDonalds because their food is the cheapest while still tasting good. I will keep buying gasoline from Alberta Tar Sands and fracking because it is the cheapest at powering my motor vehicle. I will keep getting my marijuana from a mexican drug cartel because it is more potent and cheaper than from other sources. ... way to be the rational economic actor who gives zero shits about externalities and hard-to-measure but obviously occurring consequences. Good job, dude.
- crag 11y ago
  You know, what makes you think people have such mobility? It's not easy to just "go find another job". You married, got kids, you can't afford to go find another job. At least not quickly. And quietly. Cause if your manager finds out your interviewing (and it's a small world) you're dead. I don't suppose you live outside the bubble? It's a different world in say, Kansas.
rdtsc 11y ago
> But if you know of any stories like those reported, I want you to escalate to HR. You can also email me directly at jeff@amazon.com. Even if it’s rare or isolated, our tolerance for any such lack of empathy needs to be zero. I say don't escalate to HR but leave to work at another place. HR is not your advocate, it is not there to help you. You are just a "resource" just like it says in the name. There have been many cases I've heard (personally and from HN comments) where someone would go to HR, complain about harassment by their manager, get assurance of confidentiality, and the next thing you know the manager is told right away. Or the person who complained gets punished instead. Now you can try to go public and force its hand to basically realign HR's interest (protect the company) with yours (you get heard and the problem is fixed). But that won't be forgotten in the long term.
- arethuza 11y ago
  When I worked at a multinational with hundreds of locations, HR turning up at site was sign that somebody was going to get it in the neck - HR didn't bother with small stuff so if they were about you knew it was serious for someone. [Edit: Made me think about how ghastly it must be to work in HR for a large company]
  - kabdib 11y ago
    When your immediate managers have canceled all meetings and have been unreachable for three days ... ... when there is a mandatory "all hands" meeting called with two hour's notice ... ... and when you show up, there is HR present, plus people from the management stratosphere (who you've really only ever seen in TV) ... Well, you know things are not going to go very well.
- degradas 11y ago
  There is book a called Corporate Confidential [1], written by a former HR person. One of most significant ideas there is that HR is (from the perspective of an employee) not your friend, but rather an enemy. They exist to protect the company, not you. Basically, going to HR is a quick way to get fired (for legal reasons, mind you) or kill your career. Whole book is highly depressing, but very useful if you want to try to climb up the ladder. [1] http://www.amazon.com/Corporate-Confidential-Secrets-Company-Know/dp/0312337361 http://www.amazon.com/Corporate-Confidential-Secrets-Company...
sagivo 11y ago
I'm in the process of joining Amazon as a software engineer manager. I don't know how to respond to this article and if to continue the process with them.
- steven2012 11y ago
  I have decided to stop the interview process with Amazon as a result of this article. Life is too short to have to deal with working in such a poisonous culture as described. I've had a few people mention how much Amazon sucks, at least in the Bay Area, but I thought maybe it was just a coincidence, but based on the article, it seems like it's their culture.
  - AUmrysh 11y ago
    Both interviews I did with Amazon were pretty poor. I am a little upset by their advocacy and use of visa workers, as though there are no American engineers capable of doing the work. Facebook and other tech giants are guilty of this too.
- mratzloff 11y ago
  As long as you're not under contract, you might as well find out for yourself if you like it or not.
  - revscat 11y ago
    It's getting to the point where having Amazon on your resume is a negative, though.
    - ben1040 11y ago
      How so? Technical reasons, or because people assume you've been steeped in a toxic culture long enough that you're radioactive yourself?
    - vehementi 11y ago
      It is not at all getting to that point.
austenallred 11y ago
"BREAKING: Hugely successful big co has ex employees not fully satisfied, willing to criticize it. It also has current employees who appreciate it, willing to defend it. Will keep you posted."
- mfringel 11y ago
  ....and thus it all cancels out? Show your work.
  - austenallred 11y ago
    It's just all so anecdotal. Finding five frustrated employees of a company with things would not be hard to do, and the response pointed out how many of the major complaints were severely taken out of context. It just reeks if someone trying to make a story when there is none.
    - MCRed 11y ago
      Basically, everyone not currently at amazon is admitting how much it sucks. People currently there are pretending it doesn't suck. The company does have a good reality distortion field and seems like a great place to work for the first 6 months. Then you find out they were lying to you.
    - cylinder 11y ago
      This is how most "journalism" works these days. Write your report as if the sky is falling, something extremely negative and spin it as if it's a major global trend. Then read the article and it's just some quotes from maybe three people, with very little data to back up the claim that it's a major trend. I see this type of work constantly. Especially articles about America or about "shortages." People get hyped up by a negative headline but don't think critically about the content.
    - greenyoda 11y ago
      It's not just the employees interviewed by the Times. I've read roughly 100 comments (across this and several related HN articles) from ex-Amazon employees who confirmed that their experiences at Amazon were similar to what was described in the Times article. And maybe 100 comments from people who wrote that they would never work at Amazon based on what friends they knew at Amazon have gone through. At some point, the evidence begins to build up. I think it's pretty unlikely that there's a vast conspiracy of former Amazon employees and their friends who want to spread nasty lies about Amazon.
wpietri 11y ago
For years I've had an academic interest in alternative religions. (As an atheist, I find them endlessly fascinating, as it lets you see more of how the dominant religions came to be.) One of those most interesting things I've come across related to that was the ABCDEF: http://www.neopagan.net/ABCDEF.html http://www.neopagan.net/ABCDEF.html It was put together decades ago by a pagan who wanted to help people see the difference between people who were up to something new and actually dangerous cults. The NYT article made me haul it out again and do some scoring, and then run through and score a number of the tech companies I'm familiar with. It was a very interesting exercise.
- brudgers 11y ago
  How did you rate HN?
- MCRed 11y ago
  When I worked at Amazon I felt it was very cultish. "Today is day one!" and the BS like door desks (which cost more than actual desks but give the "we're a startup!" mentality boost.) Looking on your list a surprising number of factors are much higher for amazon than for other, better jobs I've seen. It is very much a cult. Microsoft had a bit of cultism in the 1990s (Billg was infallible, etc.) and another company I've worked for since tried to be a cult...
dataker 11y ago
All of this discussion brings me to the Stanford Prison Experiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment In such hierarchical systems, the issue goes beyond abuse itself, bringing deinvidualization and loss of personal identity. That partially explains why some workers won't leave the company even for a similar/higher salary.
- c_lebesgue 11y ago
  My thoughts exactly: which one is true? A) Amazon is a kind of narcissistic codependency/Stockholm syndrome environment; B) the "horror" stories are exaggerated; C) the job is so cool that people are willing to take some abuse; D) there is other reason as to why Amazon succeeds.
blindhippo 11y ago
First world problems like no other... We're talking about highly paid professionals working at a rather cushy job all things considered. It's like listening to rich kids complain about having blue M&M's touching the red M&M's in their bowl of candy. Nothing in this whole bit of drama is shocking other then I'm not quite sure why Amazon is being singled out. All of the complaints made are systematic problems in any large corporation. The workplace isn't there to hold your hand and to be your own personal playground. In Tech, you have to earn your place every day and Amazon seems to make it clear that is the case (leadership principals, talk of hard challenges, etc). I would expect to be "managed out" if I showed up every day expecting to coast through with the bare minimum - who would want to work at a company where that is acceptable? Boycotting the company as a customer is also pretty funny to me. The chief competition is Walmart - are the activists going to order from them instead? How is that any better ethically?
- fsloth 11y ago
  A poisonous workplace with lots of employees will create huge negative externalities to the surrounding society. 1. People look up to their successfull peers. Examples succesfull companies create propagate throughout the management layers in the industry. 2. If Amazon sets a 'lets suck them dry' example then this will lower the barrier for other companies to follow suit, or enforce their existing pathologies 3. Bad work/life balance creates depressed people and is not so good for long term productivity. It might create short term kicks for adrenaline junkies and workaholics. Such practices have no rational defence, except that they appeal to certain macho people. From the POV of the company it might not be a problem since they can always hire more people to suck dry but the broken people who leave have suffered personal tragedies with various side effects. 4. What is this 'Tech' where 'one needs to earn their place every day'? It certainly does not sound like professional software engineering for sane and capable people who can choose where to work.
  - hga 11y ago
    Imagine how things might be today if General Electric chairman and CEO Jack Welch hadn't implemented and praised to the high heavens stack ranking.
otterley 11y ago
I'm actually pleased with Mr. Bezos' response. He doesn't deny any of the stories in the article, and he doesn't try to explain any of them away. His attitude strikes me as one of a problem-solver and one who cares about his company's reputation. I can't recall the last time I heard the CEO of a large company say publicly, "if you've been treated this way, reach out to me personally."
- masklinn 11y ago
  Sending people to HR in the US is not a way to solve a problem, unless you define "the problem" as "employees complaining to HR".
- Mithaldu 11y ago
  His personal email address is 100% guaranteed staffed by a team of secretaries. It might've been respectable if it had been an email specifically for such complaints and no other user, and instructions on how to send things to it anonymously. But as things stand it's just an attempt to get people like you, who haven't been burned badly enough yet, to think he's actually being "nice" there.
  - kilroy123 11y ago
    He probably really sees all emails sent to him internally from an amazon email address.
- MCRed 11y ago
  It's a lie. I knew him well enough when I worked there that I could have reached out to him personally and he would have known who I was. This is all by design. He couldn't care less about employees. He does care about the reputation of the company, of course, because it's important for his net worth.
satai 11y ago
Jeff Bezos is definitely the new Steve Jobs.
- MCRed 11y ago
  Jobs was a good guy who, under it all, had engineering skill and design chops. He was compassionate and intelligent. Jobs built a great company that makes real profits by selling real products. Bezos is a psychopath, a hack who only cares about manipulating the situation in his favor. He has built a shell of a retailer whos only profitable product is its own stock.
  - serge2k 11y ago
    Jobs was a good guy. Wasn't he known for being outright cruel to employees? Didn't he foster a culture of infighting and ridiculous hours? Wasn't he a deadbeat dad for a couple decades? Did he have engineering skill? He had vision and a level of genius, but I'm not sure it applies to Engineering skill. Odd that you give that to him but not to Bezos.
webwanderings 11y ago
The second last paragraph there, is really strange! It almost sounds like as if, he'd rather people leave if they don't like it.
beauzero 11y ago
I think the point is being missed. As long as Amazon has "interesting" problems to solve they will get good people (look at what PhD candidates will suffer). If they don't then only those who can't leave will be left behind. I know this is cynical but it is also why I love this field so much. I look for interesting problems to solve...not huge benefits. Money just doesn't get me up in the morning. Will I die poor...maybe...its not a big concern because I love what I do. Keeping it "interesting" is the problem that needs to be solved at Amazon. So far they have been very successful at that.
- c_lebesgue 11y ago
  Honest question: do you think that only Amazon has interesting problems to solve? I do not know much about the company internally, but there exist other companies that compensate and treat employees better, such as Google or Facebook.
  - beauzero 11y ago
    Sorry for the misunderstanding. Maybe I didn't phrase my thoughts well. Amazon's problem is providing "interesting" problems. Interesting problems also are usually very niche. The problems that Google and Facebook are trying to solve don't necessarily overlap with those being solved by Amazon. My comment was more aimed at the viability of Amazon finding the most capable people it could. It seems to have removed "culture" as a positive and the only thing that it has going for it is "interesting" problems. Without them Amazon will rot. So far they continue to allow people to work on cool things.
- Moshe_Silnorin 11y ago
  The problem with this is, with some marginal effort you could get vastly more money and interesting problems. Accepting a low salary out of some misguided notion that money isn't important to you is silly. Money gives you options you would not otherwise have - a great salary combined with thrift can facilitate an unusual amount of career flexibility. At the very least, you can donate the money you don't need to GiveWell and save a few lives.
OnleMeMeMe 11y ago
As if Jeff is reading jeff@amazon.com - would be the first enterprise CEO I know who reads his mail instead of a web of (personal) assistants.
- ceejayoz 11y ago
  http://stevemail.tumblr.com/ http://stevemail.tumblr.com/
- umanwizard 11y ago
  From what I can gather, he reads anything sent from another internal (@amazon.com) address personally. Stuff from outside probably goes to assistants.
  - OnleMeMeMe 11y ago
    Cool, thx.
backtoyoujim 11y ago
This just reaffirms my prognostication that Bezos and Clarkson will end in fisticuffs.
outside1234 11y ago
And like clockwork, there is the PR reaction. Whatever you do, don't write to HR or Jeff - that is amateur hour stuff to smoke out the problem people.
joesmo 11y ago
Sounds like Bezos is just doing damage control. The original article is somewhat interesting but hardly novel. I've never talked to a single person who worked at Amazon who had anything positive to say. You have recruiters recruiting for Amazon who are basically saying, "Do not work there." They are being paid on commission to get you to work there and they're telling you what a horrible place to work it is, killing any chance of moving forward. I find that quite telling of what kind of place Amazon is.
- adventured 11y ago
  And yet Amazon (3.4) rates comparable on Glassdoor to many other important technology companies, including: Oracle (3.3), Yahoo (3.5), HP (3.3), IBM (3.1), eBay (3.5), Tesla (3.4), Dell (3.4), Cisco (3.7). That's with 5,800+ reviews. Something doesn't add up.
  - drzaiusapelord 11y ago
    How reliable is glassdoor as a metric? Personally, I would never, ever post anything negative there due to the fear of retaliation. I suspect truly bad companies never get their comeuppance because at the end of the day, you need some kind of reference and positive job history from your previous employer. It may not be that hard to trace a review to a specific employee due to timing, title, salary, etc information.
    - taternuts 11y ago
      I've seen plenty of instances where the Glassdor listings were really a red flag. In these cases, there are several negative reviews focusing on similar cons, then several other glowing (and obviously planted) reviews to combat it.
    - DaveWalk 11y ago
      According to the dozen seasoned job-hunters and recruiters that I know, Glassdoor is absolutely rotten in my industry (biotech). The selection bias is heavy-handed at best. Even Amazon's 5,000+ reviews represent a very small fraction of it's employees globally. These are futher selected as the kind who would review a job online pseudoanomyously. Furthermore, one doesn't know the age of a review -- is this a current employee, a previous one who left last week or a review of a the job from 10 years ago? It's entirely possible that every problem addressed in a negative review has been since addressed. You just don't know.
quotha 11y ago
Jeff needs to read the cluetrain manifesto (again), http://cluetrain.com/index.html http://cluetrain.com/index.html
notNow 11y ago
I strongly believe that anyone working in a company that really is like the one described in the NYT would be crazy to stay. I know I would leave such a company. The cynic in me would interpret this as a tacit invitation by the Bezo-man himself to unhappy employees to beat it and don't let the door hit them on their rears on their way out if they don't like working here but I could be wrong but with the likes of Bezos and Ellison, you shouldn't set the bar really high when it comes to human empathy.
rm_-rf_slash 11y ago
This kind of thing reminded me of when Eric Schmidt justified Google's reputationally low pay by saying "people don't work at Google for the money, they do it to change the world!" Of course, Google's stock made him a billionaire. To me this problem seems to root itself in the absurdity of equity percentages. How is it one who comes to the company a year after founding can work the same 10-12 hour days as a founder and yet see maybe 1% in options they have to pay for while founders expect 15% and up for being there at the beginning? Seems all right when the company is young and the risk is high, but what ends up happening is that the fresh blood 10,20 years on has to fight for scraps while the now-wealthy founders can enjoy their work knowing they could quit tomorrow and never have to lift a finger again. White collar Walmart could pay its employees squarely to compensate for their mental health and social lives, but they act almost allergic to profits as long as they can continue stock offerings to keep prices at a minimum.
dredmorbius 11y ago
Bezos needs to buy some Robert Anton Wilson from himself. Celine's Second Law: Accurate communication is possible only in a non-punishing situation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celine%27s_laws https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celine%27s_laws
vadym909 11y ago
To the people that say an employee should just quit- it isn't that easy. 1. While it may be good for your resume to show you got selected by AMZN, the reverse is it hurts your resume to show you only lasted a few months which may imply it was a hiring mistake and you couldn't cut it. 2. If you took a big relocation package or sign-on bonus, you may feel inclined to stick it out even if it not healthy to not have to pay back and to deflect #1.
fsloth 11y ago
A particularly fitting past discussion in HN about among other things Amazon:https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4195136 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4195136
qihqi 11y ago
As an exAmazonian I think Amazon treated me decently. I ultimately left for some place that treat me even better (with free food and better pay); but I did not believe that I am entitled to those perks. Judging by life of the few Amazonians I know personally, most of them agree with me. I only know one person who complained heavily about Amazon and it is more about his team and having a crappy boss than about the company.
- myth_buster 11y ago
  but I did not believe that I am entitled to those perks This is the hook as people usually underestimate themselves and this comes into play during salary negotiations too.
MCRed 11y ago
Escalate to HR? That's exactly what I did. Jeff is spinning his typical BS. My boss was abusive, drove off %70 of the team and was dealing drugs to other employees in the PacMed garage. He lied to me many times, and I started documenting it. I went to HR about it, trying to get support so I could transfer out to a team at AWS, where I knew the manager and he had offered me a job. The HR person assured me that everything that I told her would be kept confidential. She insisted I tell her what was going on with my boss, and thus why I wanted to leave. I did tell her, and she then turned around and told my boss all of it. (I didn't tell her he was dealing drugs, I actually felt physically vulnerable to him because he had a violent temper-- his training was to be a prison guard and that's what he wanted to be before somehow he was hired at Amazon to manage programmers despite having difficulty even with simple things like spreadsheets and Excel.) The HR at Amazon is an organization that is a big part of the problem. After she told my boss they started coming up with sudden complaint about my performance and scheduled a meeting with the HR person.. who then talked bout the things I had told her in confidence, in front of my boss (though I knew he already knew) as if there had never been any reason for me to expect confidence. Also, I worked with Jeff Bezos on enough occasions that he knew who I was, and would say hello by name in the hallway. The idea that i could have gone to him directly with a complaint about my boss is asinine in the extreme. He would have passed it on to HR and it would have been the same thing. He might have cared about the drug dealing thing ,but only because it put the company at risk. The lack of empathy, and the rest of the employee hostile corporate culture ORIGINATES with Jeff Bezos. HE is the source and the cause and to him -- and this is a libertarian speaking-- everyone's existence is the sum total of the money they make him. In fact, I think Jeff Bezos is a pathological liar and a psychopath. He's very charming, heartless and able to fake warmth. Clearly he has had PR training too. But he's the evil at the core of Amazon. I've had extensive dealings with Microsoft and Apple and other big companies-- none were any where close to as toxic and heartless as Amazon. Jeff really sees people as resources to be exploited and could not care less about employee development, or retention. In fact, the back stabbing, competitive nature that makes it such a toxic environment is designed in some sort of "survival of the fittest" delusion-- the product is regularly sacrificed (and amazon.com is pretty much a joke how broken it is-- still is, in fact) as a result. You win at Amazon by playing politics, not by being good at your job. PS-- why was I stupid enough to go to HR? I've worked mostly for startups, and it was the job previous to this that was my first real experience with an HR "department" which was one person, who was damn good, and exceptional at mediation and conflict resolution, full of integrity and trustworthy. I didn't have experience at large companies to know that HR was mostly filled with drama addicted flunkies.
eip 11y ago
https://gist.github.com/chitchcock/1281611 https://gist.github.com/chitchcock/1281611 "Ha, ha! You 150-odd ex-Amazon folks here will of course realize immediately that #7 was a little joke I threw in, because Bezos most definitely does not give a shit about your day." "We're talking about a guy who in all seriousness has said on many public occasions that people should be paying him to work at Amazon. He hands out little yellow stickies with his name on them, reminding people "who runs the company" when they disagree with him. The guy is a regular... well, Steve Jobs, I guess. Except without the fashion or design sense. Bezos is super smart; don't get me wrong. He just makes ordinary control freaks look like stoned hippies." "At this point they don't even do it out of fear of being fired. I mean, they're still afraid of that; it's pretty much part of daily life there, working for the Dread Pirate Bezos and all."
ArtDev 11y ago
Most folks know that Amazon warehouses are abusive. Why did it take Mr. Bezos so long to figure this out? He deserves the benefit of the doubt, but its hard to believe he didn't already know.
kdamken 11y ago
I'm always blown away when I read things like this: "Even many Amazonians who have worked on Wall Street and at start-ups say the workloads at the new South Lake Union campus can be extreme: marathon conference calls on Easter Sunday and Thanksgiving, criticism from bosses for spotty Internet access on vacation, and hours spent working at home most nights or weekends." Is this something people are proud of? You're working for a shipping company, how do you get that brainwashed that you sign your life away like that? I understand as you move up the ranks in seniority more is expected of you, but I'm always surprised by the lack of self respect and boundaries people have for themselves in professional environments.
zeruch 11y ago
...except for Jeff's own habits. Now I don't actually have a bad view of Amazon on the whole, but Bezos and his personality is well known for many years as demanding to the point of monomaniacal, and often cowing of others. That isn't just taking a pot shot, that's a repeated observation from many people over many years. It's like saying Larry Ellison likes boats or Scott McNealy hates dentists.

175 points by ennuihenry 11y ago

tajen 11y ago

Jeff Bezos encourages employees a "careful read" of the NYT article and the read of "a very different take by a current Amazonian" on LinkedIn. What I see is a company with a big PR department who hasn't succeeded to spin positive stories about their HR in newspapers. We'll see in the next months whether they prop up their game. Besides, if you face a difficulty with your work environment, don't talk to HR™. They are paid to exclude any PR hazard from the company. NB: Moderator/dang, please merge with https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10072753 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10072753

seibelj 11y ago

I've been reading various comments about this around the internet and many people are saying they will stop ordering from Amazon because of it. These white collar workers are highly paid, and not forced to be there. Most of them could easily find another job someplace else (and it sounds like many do). I just can't feel bad for them. If you don't want to work throughout your vacation, go find another job that won't make you work through your vacation. This isn't North Korea, Bezos isn't going to throw you in a reeducation camp. I will keep ordering from Amazon because they provide the best service. Simple as that.

leftnode 11y ago
Unless you're on a visa and having a job is a requirement of keeping said visa.
- seibelj 11y ago
  That is the same situation at any company with H1B's, and I didn't see anything in the article that mentioned abuse of those workers specifically.
  - wtetzner 11y ago
    The point is it's not so easy to leave in that situation.
- ClayM 11y ago
  or if you work in one of the warehouses
supercanuck 11y ago
Honestly, I would need to see white collar women shackled to computers in dilapidated warehouses on 60 minutes before I had to give up 2 Day Shipping, and even then I'd probably convince myself that the exposure means change is happening and start using again
- knightofmars 11y ago
  To those who have down voted this comment, you down vote this comment for being distasteful without recognizing the reality and honesty its perspective provides.
comrh 11y ago
I just think they shouldn't act like such jerks and treat employees like human beings who are on your team. Sure they have the ability to leave, I'm just trying to support better behavior though.
amirmc 11y ago
That reasoning could also be applied to anyone who's suffering in an abusive relationship (whether emotional or physical). It would be inappropriate then, just as it's inappropriate here. In addition, not everything has to be decided solely by where one spends their money. It's entirely possible to put pressure on an organisation through other means.
- seibelj 11y ago
  This isn't a man who is beating his wife. The employee doesn't have the social pressure to stay with someone they married rather than face the shame of divorce. The employee doesn't have a part of them that is literally in love with the abuser (a company). It's a stretch to use the 'abused spouse' argument with highly educated knowledge workers making 6 figure salaries. Find a new job.
  - nilkn 11y ago
    > The employee doesn't have the social pressure to stay with someone they married rather than face the shame of divorce. Actually, workplaces like this tend to thrive on social pressure and psychological manipulation. The NYT article paints a picture in which people begin undergoing brainwashing on day one. A workplace can most definitely create a very powerful culture of internal shaming. That said, leaving an abusive relationship is still likely to be harder, for a few reasons. First, there's true love involved -- no employee was ever truly in love with Amazon. Second, there are logistical reasons -- it's probably easier to quit Amazon and find another job than it is for many people to leave an abusive relationship and get back on their own independent feet. But I think it's still dangerous to underestimate the social pressures that a large corporation can create.
zamalek 11y ago
I'm not advocating or rejecting the Amazon boycott, simply here to challenge the way you think: while everything you said is logical you can't simply treat people like trash, it doesn't matter if they are white collar, gold collar or can't-afford-a-collar. A situation that shares many similarities is: "it is that woman's fault that she does not leave her abusive husband." That is laying blame on the person who was abused (not matter their background) instead of the person dealing out the injustice. Imagine that Bezos had not disowned this behavior: more and more would follow suit and eventually you'd be hard-pressed to find a place where this isn't the norm. For example: stack ranking had to start somewhere. Now you'll find it at many places and it's no longer as simple as "just go work somewhere else." If you've acquired a lifestyle where you depend on a corporate job with a cushy salary, what are you going to do? Don't forget that people can (and do) undervalue themselves. Maybe they don't believe that they could find another job: possibly because their manager has completely destroyed their self-worth. Finally, it's just fucking stupid. It's actually counter-productive. It's been shown over and over again (one example[1]) that the way you get better results out of humans is to treat them humanely and, unbelievably, make them want to work for you instead of work for you out of fear. Practices like this, stack ranking, etc. all originate out of the industrial age when machines were the primary concern - you can't manage humans like machines: they will revolt (consciously or subconsciously). [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc
- XorNot 11y ago
  Even if you haven't acquired a lifestyle. It's not like things get better when management adopts some new terrible practice for non-salaried employees. By and large they live day to day stack-ranking all sorts of far more abusive BS.
- beachstartup 11y ago
  > A situation that shares many similarities is: "it is that woman's fault that she does not leave her abusive husband." oh please. this isn't reddit, HN is full of grown adults with jobs and relationships that live in the real world. women have full agency in 2015 and to claim they don't is so insulting and sexist i don't even know where to begin. same with white collar professionals. i don't condone what amazon does but it's your own damn fault if you decide to stay, and same with individuals MALE OR FEMALE in abusive relationships, and believe you me there are plenty of males in horrendous relationships - physically, mentally, and emotionally abused by their wives or girlfriends.
atopuzov 11y ago
Some people signed the contract thinking it's a decent place to work but found out later it's not. They received relocation bonus (which they have to return if they leave within 2 years), left their previous job, are now in a country where there visa depends on being employed by Amazon so things are not as black and white as you would like to represent them and they just can't leave as easily as some. It's not slavery, but it's not far from indentured servitude. P.S. I'm not in that situation but have a few colleagues who are, and going back to Ukraine for them is not an option.
andersonmvd 11y ago
It's not just a matter of whether it looks like North Korea or not, it's a matter of what kind of companies you want to see out there. You may approve it or not, and you can respond to it. One way to respond is to stop ordering from Amazon.
drzaiusapelord 11y ago
>Most of them could easily find another job someplace else Not too long ago we laughed at open offices and tiny cubes with half or quarter height walls as just desserts for low wage workers like call center operators. After all, if they wanted better conditions they should make themselves more marketable. Now coders are having to deal with these punishing layouts due to them being a current executive fad. Now every executive at every company is buying into this "treat them like shit" philosophy. Between this and H1B visa abuse, where exactly do domestic workers flee to? You can work for company X with a crappy culture or company Y with a crappy culture. Illusion of choice isn't choice.
- inversionOf 11y ago
  Terrible working conditions have been the norm for many coders for as long as there has been coding. In the late 90s, Joel Spolsky rose by being a contrarian and advocating good work conditions. Microsoft was always held as an extreme outlier with its good conditions. Everyone was agape about the .com bubble because companies were giving employees nice chairs (which in retrospect seems absurd...something so minor as a signal of excess). The point, I suppose, is that our own information funnels often mislead us into trends and "averages", when it's just cycles.
  - drzaiusapelord 11y ago
    Maybe, but I'm probably a lot older than your average HN'er and I remember my first few jobs. Everyone had an office. The sysadmin had one, the developers each had one, the manager did, etc. Or at the very least had a proper full size cube with proper size walls. There was an emphasis of privacy and quiet time because everyone needed to concentrate to get shit done. Walking into IT was like walking into a library. 10+ years ago was the last time I saw IT staff in offices outside of management or even a proper full sized, full walled cube.
    - hga 11y ago
      Indeed, I myself started working in 1980 and it sure seems like it was better then, but I can't isolate that from working in the Boston area until its high tech scene finished dying a hard death in the early '90s (the web created a new one a little later) and I moved to the D.C. area which you might say didn't have as high standards.
nilkn 11y ago
I really do not think that someone being well-paid is justification for treating them poorly. Surely an employee should just be treated well, period. I actually think your line of thinking here is incredibly dangerous -- you seem to think that if someone is well-paid it's okay to treat them like dirt, as if you have to balance things out somehow. And regardless of how well-paid any of them may or may not be (keep in mind these are not just the developers), they all might have made real sacrifices in their lives to work for Amazon without realizing what they were getting into. Quitting a beloved former job for what appeared to be a much needed pay raise, moving cross country with your family, etc... I'm not boycotting anything but everyone has a right to be upset when they're mistreated.
a_c_s 11y ago
Workers, white-collar or not, are seldom sold a job with full information: working through vacation isn't the kind of thing mentioned in job postings. I don't think anyone should be forced to work through their vacation: that's why it is called vacation. If you don't want people to take vacation then don't offer it, but offering vacation "in name only" is the worst of all possible worlds. I want to live in a world where companies treat their workers well and therefore I don't want to patronize companies that willfully and systemically dehumanize them.
Rainymood 11y ago
>I will keep ordering from Amazon because they provide the best service. Simple as that. I will keep buying from clothes from Primark because they provide the cheapest. Simple as that. ...
aikah 11y ago
> I've been reading various comments about this around the internet and many people are saying they will stop ordering from Amazon because of it. Well it's because the people who are Amazon customers can relate these white collars being "harassed" at Amazon. It's because of a lot of these customers might have lived the same situation and know how horrible this is.
netcan 11y ago
Implied in your comment is that employees (assuming they are employable white collar employees) are empowered economic actors. They keep choosing to work there. I think the reality of the employee-employer relationship is that employees don't have the sort of power, as one would have as a customer, for example. Part of the reasons are probably explainable economically. It's a fairly illiquid market for employees because the cost of getting to an agreement, negotiating terms (never-mind sampling) is very high. A lot of other reasons are probably best explained psychologically or anthropologically, roles we assume in certain situations. I suspect these are the bigger ones. Either way, barriers are there and bad treatment of employees often results in badly treated employees, not empty just resignations. In a lot of ways, "if you don't like it, get another job" like "if you don't like it, get another country." The free exchange economistic-ey forces are there, but they are not the only things there. Other things that make employers behave better is standards set by society. These are laws, but also just norms and practices. These are impacted by things like articles or consumer responses. It's complicated. I'm fairly sympathetic to a lot of libertarian positions. But, I don't buy into the strong economic rationalist arguments. Economic forces dictate how some things play out. other times, other cultural forces take effect. When it comes to employee treatment, I think societal norms are a massive influence. The reaction you are observing is part a mechanism for this. Society's scolding amazon for treating its employees badly, defining and enforcing the nom..
- chaostheory 11y ago
  > In a lot of ways, "if you don't like it, get another job" like "if you don't like it, get another country." There are big differences between the two unless you live in a state that borders Canada. In most cases, getting a new job does not require you to relocate far away or significantly change your lifestyle. > It's a fairly illiquid market for employees because the cost of getting to an agreement, negotiating terms (never-mind sampling) is very high. Is this cost higher than staying miserable? About the only thing I can think of for being forced to stay employed with Amazon is to complete the "two year tour of duty" for your resume. I'd agree with you more if we were discussing uneducated and unskilled workers. However unless I missed something I feel that we were talking about skilled and educated workers that are in demand by many companies. That said I'm not condoning any company that has bad practices and I'm still sympathetic to anyone that gets poorly treated at any company, while at the same time I feel that staying with a company that makes you unhappy as an highly in demand worker is a conscious choice you make as an adult. I don't feel that most people have work contracts. Employment is at will for both the employer and employee.
pdabbadabba 11y ago
I don't plan to boycott either, but I can see why others do. Whether Amazon's employees are white collar or not, and whether or not they freely choose to work there, I still find it morally objectionable for Amazon to treat their employees the way that they apparently do. Of course this is not as bad as taking advantage of desperate, low-skill workers, or taking advantage of lax labor standards abroad. But white-collar Amazon workers are still people and the managers at Amazon still owe them at least some duty to not willfully make their lives miserable. (And, by the way, there are also stories out there about Amazon's treatment of lower-skilled, less "free" warehouse employees, etc. which would, I think, be better cause for boycott if true. But that's really a different subject.)
cowardlydragon 11y ago
I will keep ordering from McDonalds because their food is the cheapest while still tasting good. I will keep buying gasoline from Alberta Tar Sands and fracking because it is the cheapest at powering my motor vehicle. I will keep getting my marijuana from a mexican drug cartel because it is more potent and cheaper than from other sources. ... way to be the rational economic actor who gives zero shits about externalities and hard-to-measure but obviously occurring consequences. Good job, dude.
crag 11y ago
You know, what makes you think people have such mobility? It's not easy to just "go find another job". You married, got kids, you can't afford to go find another job. At least not quickly. And quietly. Cause if your manager finds out your interviewing (and it's a small world) you're dead. I don't suppose you live outside the bubble? It's a different world in say, Kansas.

rdtsc 11y ago

> But if you know of any stories like those reported, I want you to escalate to HR. You can also email me directly at jeff@amazon.com. Even if it’s rare or isolated, our tolerance for any such lack of empathy needs to be zero. I say don't escalate to HR but leave to work at another place. HR is not your advocate, it is not there to help you. You are just a "resource" just like it says in the name. There have been many cases I've heard (personally and from HN comments) where someone would go to HR, complain about harassment by their manager, get assurance of confidentiality, and the next thing you know the manager is told right away. Or the person who complained gets punished instead. Now you can try to go public and force its hand to basically realign HR's interest (protect the company) with yours (you get heard and the problem is fixed). But that won't be forgotten in the long term.

arethuza 11y ago
When I worked at a multinational with hundreds of locations, HR turning up at site was sign that somebody was going to get it in the neck - HR didn't bother with small stuff so if they were about you knew it was serious for someone. [Edit: Made me think about how ghastly it must be to work in HR for a large company]
- kabdib 11y ago
  When your immediate managers have canceled all meetings and have been unreachable for three days ... ... when there is a mandatory "all hands" meeting called with two hour's notice ... ... and when you show up, there is HR present, plus people from the management stratosphere (who you've really only ever seen in TV) ... Well, you know things are not going to go very well.
degradas 11y ago
There is book a called Corporate Confidential [1], written by a former HR person. One of most significant ideas there is that HR is (from the perspective of an employee) not your friend, but rather an enemy. They exist to protect the company, not you. Basically, going to HR is a quick way to get fired (for legal reasons, mind you) or kill your career. Whole book is highly depressing, but very useful if you want to try to climb up the ladder. [1] http://www.amazon.com/Corporate-Confidential-Secrets-Company-Know/dp/0312337361 http://www.amazon.com/Corporate-Confidential-Secrets-Company...

sagivo 11y ago

I'm in the process of joining Amazon as a software engineer manager. I don't know how to respond to this article and if to continue the process with them.

steven2012 11y ago
I have decided to stop the interview process with Amazon as a result of this article. Life is too short to have to deal with working in such a poisonous culture as described. I've had a few people mention how much Amazon sucks, at least in the Bay Area, but I thought maybe it was just a coincidence, but based on the article, it seems like it's their culture.
- AUmrysh 11y ago
  Both interviews I did with Amazon were pretty poor. I am a little upset by their advocacy and use of visa workers, as though there are no American engineers capable of doing the work. Facebook and other tech giants are guilty of this too.
mratzloff 11y ago
As long as you're not under contract, you might as well find out for yourself if you like it or not.
- revscat 11y ago
  It's getting to the point where having Amazon on your resume is a negative, though.
  - ben1040 11y ago
    How so? Technical reasons, or because people assume you've been steeped in a toxic culture long enough that you're radioactive yourself?
  - vehementi 11y ago
    It is not at all getting to that point.

austenallred 11y ago

"BREAKING: Hugely successful big co has ex employees not fully satisfied, willing to criticize it. It also has current employees who appreciate it, willing to defend it. Will keep you posted."

mfringel 11y ago
....and thus it all cancels out? Show your work.
- austenallred 11y ago
  It's just all so anecdotal. Finding five frustrated employees of a company with things would not be hard to do, and the response pointed out how many of the major complaints were severely taken out of context. It just reeks if someone trying to make a story when there is none.
  - MCRed 11y ago
    Basically, everyone not currently at amazon is admitting how much it sucks. People currently there are pretending it doesn't suck. The company does have a good reality distortion field and seems like a great place to work for the first 6 months. Then you find out they were lying to you.
  - cylinder 11y ago
    This is how most "journalism" works these days. Write your report as if the sky is falling, something extremely negative and spin it as if it's a major global trend. Then read the article and it's just some quotes from maybe three people, with very little data to back up the claim that it's a major trend. I see this type of work constantly. Especially articles about America or about "shortages." People get hyped up by a negative headline but don't think critically about the content.
  - greenyoda 11y ago
    It's not just the employees interviewed by the Times. I've read roughly 100 comments (across this and several related HN articles) from ex-Amazon employees who confirmed that their experiences at Amazon were similar to what was described in the Times article. And maybe 100 comments from people who wrote that they would never work at Amazon based on what friends they knew at Amazon have gone through. At some point, the evidence begins to build up. I think it's pretty unlikely that there's a vast conspiracy of former Amazon employees and their friends who want to spread nasty lies about Amazon.

wpietri 11y ago

For years I've had an academic interest in alternative religions. (As an atheist, I find them endlessly fascinating, as it lets you see more of how the dominant religions came to be.) One of those most interesting things I've come across related to that was the ABCDEF: http://www.neopagan.net/ABCDEF.html http://www.neopagan.net/ABCDEF.html It was put together decades ago by a pagan who wanted to help people see the difference between people who were up to something new and actually dangerous cults. The NYT article made me haul it out again and do some scoring, and then run through and score a number of the tech companies I'm familiar with. It was a very interesting exercise.

brudgers 11y ago
How did you rate HN?
MCRed 11y ago
When I worked at Amazon I felt it was very cultish. "Today is day one!" and the BS like door desks (which cost more than actual desks but give the "we're a startup!" mentality boost.) Looking on your list a surprising number of factors are much higher for amazon than for other, better jobs I've seen. It is very much a cult. Microsoft had a bit of cultism in the 1990s (Billg was infallible, etc.) and another company I've worked for since tried to be a cult...

dataker 11y ago

All of this discussion brings me to the Stanford Prison Experiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment In such hierarchical systems, the issue goes beyond abuse itself, bringing deinvidualization and loss of personal identity. That partially explains why some workers won't leave the company even for a similar/higher salary.

c_lebesgue 11y ago
My thoughts exactly: which one is true? A) Amazon is a kind of narcissistic codependency/Stockholm syndrome environment; B) the "horror" stories are exaggerated; C) the job is so cool that people are willing to take some abuse; D) there is other reason as to why Amazon succeeds.

blindhippo 11y ago

First world problems like no other... We're talking about highly paid professionals working at a rather cushy job all things considered. It's like listening to rich kids complain about having blue M&M's touching the red M&M's in their bowl of candy. Nothing in this whole bit of drama is shocking other then I'm not quite sure why Amazon is being singled out. All of the complaints made are systematic problems in any large corporation. The workplace isn't there to hold your hand and to be your own personal playground. In Tech, you have to earn your place every day and Amazon seems to make it clear that is the case (leadership principals, talk of hard challenges, etc). I would expect to be "managed out" if I showed up every day expecting to coast through with the bare minimum - who would want to work at a company where that is acceptable? Boycotting the company as a customer is also pretty funny to me. The chief competition is Walmart - are the activists going to order from them instead? How is that any better ethically?

fsloth 11y ago
A poisonous workplace with lots of employees will create huge negative externalities to the surrounding society. 1. People look up to their successfull peers. Examples succesfull companies create propagate throughout the management layers in the industry. 2. If Amazon sets a 'lets suck them dry' example then this will lower the barrier for other companies to follow suit, or enforce their existing pathologies 3. Bad work/life balance creates depressed people and is not so good for long term productivity. It might create short term kicks for adrenaline junkies and workaholics. Such practices have no rational defence, except that they appeal to certain macho people. From the POV of the company it might not be a problem since they can always hire more people to suck dry but the broken people who leave have suffered personal tragedies with various side effects. 4. What is this 'Tech' where 'one needs to earn their place every day'? It certainly does not sound like professional software engineering for sane and capable people who can choose where to work.
- hga 11y ago
  Imagine how things might be today if General Electric chairman and CEO Jack Welch hadn't implemented and praised to the high heavens stack ranking.

otterley 11y ago

I'm actually pleased with Mr. Bezos' response. He doesn't deny any of the stories in the article, and he doesn't try to explain any of them away. His attitude strikes me as one of a problem-solver and one who cares about his company's reputation. I can't recall the last time I heard the CEO of a large company say publicly, "if you've been treated this way, reach out to me personally."

masklinn 11y ago
Sending people to HR in the US is not a way to solve a problem, unless you define "the problem" as "employees complaining to HR".
Mithaldu 11y ago
His personal email address is 100% guaranteed staffed by a team of secretaries. It might've been respectable if it had been an email specifically for such complaints and no other user, and instructions on how to send things to it anonymously. But as things stand it's just an attempt to get people like you, who haven't been burned badly enough yet, to think he's actually being "nice" there.
- kilroy123 11y ago
  He probably really sees all emails sent to him internally from an amazon email address.
MCRed 11y ago
It's a lie. I knew him well enough when I worked there that I could have reached out to him personally and he would have known who I was. This is all by design. He couldn't care less about employees. He does care about the reputation of the company, of course, because it's important for his net worth.

satai 11y ago

Jeff Bezos is definitely the new Steve Jobs.

MCRed 11y ago
Jobs was a good guy who, under it all, had engineering skill and design chops. He was compassionate and intelligent. Jobs built a great company that makes real profits by selling real products. Bezos is a psychopath, a hack who only cares about manipulating the situation in his favor. He has built a shell of a retailer whos only profitable product is its own stock.
- serge2k 11y ago
  Jobs was a good guy. Wasn't he known for being outright cruel to employees? Didn't he foster a culture of infighting and ridiculous hours? Wasn't he a deadbeat dad for a couple decades? Did he have engineering skill? He had vision and a level of genius, but I'm not sure it applies to Engineering skill. Odd that you give that to him but not to Bezos.

webwanderings 11y ago

The second last paragraph there, is really strange! It almost sounds like as if, he'd rather people leave if they don't like it.

beauzero 11y ago

I think the point is being missed. As long as Amazon has "interesting" problems to solve they will get good people (look at what PhD candidates will suffer). If they don't then only those who can't leave will be left behind. I know this is cynical but it is also why I love this field so much. I look for interesting problems to solve...not huge benefits. Money just doesn't get me up in the morning. Will I die poor...maybe...its not a big concern because I love what I do. Keeping it "interesting" is the problem that needs to be solved at Amazon. So far they have been very successful at that.

c_lebesgue 11y ago
Honest question: do you think that only Amazon has interesting problems to solve? I do not know much about the company internally, but there exist other companies that compensate and treat employees better, such as Google or Facebook.
- beauzero 11y ago
  Sorry for the misunderstanding. Maybe I didn't phrase my thoughts well. Amazon's problem is providing "interesting" problems. Interesting problems also are usually very niche. The problems that Google and Facebook are trying to solve don't necessarily overlap with those being solved by Amazon. My comment was more aimed at the viability of Amazon finding the most capable people it could. It seems to have removed "culture" as a positive and the only thing that it has going for it is "interesting" problems. Without them Amazon will rot. So far they continue to allow people to work on cool things.
Moshe_Silnorin 11y ago
The problem with this is, with some marginal effort you could get vastly more money and interesting problems. Accepting a low salary out of some misguided notion that money isn't important to you is silly. Money gives you options you would not otherwise have - a great salary combined with thrift can facilitate an unusual amount of career flexibility. At the very least, you can donate the money you don't need to GiveWell and save a few lives.

OnleMeMeMe 11y ago

As if Jeff is reading jeff@amazon.com - would be the first enterprise CEO I know who reads his mail instead of a web of (personal) assistants.

ceejayoz 11y ago
http://stevemail.tumblr.com/ http://stevemail.tumblr.com/
umanwizard 11y ago
From what I can gather, he reads anything sent from another internal (@amazon.com) address personally. Stuff from outside probably goes to assistants.
- OnleMeMeMe 11y ago
  Cool, thx.

backtoyoujim 11y ago

This just reaffirms my prognostication that Bezos and Clarkson will end in fisticuffs.

outside1234 11y ago

And like clockwork, there is the PR reaction. Whatever you do, don't write to HR or Jeff - that is amateur hour stuff to smoke out the problem people.

joesmo 11y ago

Sounds like Bezos is just doing damage control. The original article is somewhat interesting but hardly novel. I've never talked to a single person who worked at Amazon who had anything positive to say. You have recruiters recruiting for Amazon who are basically saying, "Do not work there." They are being paid on commission to get you to work there and they're telling you what a horrible place to work it is, killing any chance of moving forward. I find that quite telling of what kind of place Amazon is.

adventured 11y ago
And yet Amazon (3.4) rates comparable on Glassdoor to many other important technology companies, including: Oracle (3.3), Yahoo (3.5), HP (3.3), IBM (3.1), eBay (3.5), Tesla (3.4), Dell (3.4), Cisco (3.7). That's with 5,800+ reviews. Something doesn't add up.
- drzaiusapelord 11y ago
  How reliable is glassdoor as a metric? Personally, I would never, ever post anything negative there due to the fear of retaliation. I suspect truly bad companies never get their comeuppance because at the end of the day, you need some kind of reference and positive job history from your previous employer. It may not be that hard to trace a review to a specific employee due to timing, title, salary, etc information.
  - taternuts 11y ago
    I've seen plenty of instances where the Glassdor listings were really a red flag. In these cases, there are several negative reviews focusing on similar cons, then several other glowing (and obviously planted) reviews to combat it.
  - DaveWalk 11y ago
    According to the dozen seasoned job-hunters and recruiters that I know, Glassdoor is absolutely rotten in my industry (biotech). The selection bias is heavy-handed at best. Even Amazon's 5,000+ reviews represent a very small fraction of it's employees globally. These are futher selected as the kind who would review a job online pseudoanomyously. Furthermore, one doesn't know the age of a review -- is this a current employee, a previous one who left last week or a review of a the job from 10 years ago? It's entirely possible that every problem addressed in a negative review has been since addressed. You just don't know.

quotha 11y ago

Jeff needs to read the cluetrain manifesto (again), http://cluetrain.com/index.html http://cluetrain.com/index.html

notNow 11y ago

I strongly believe that anyone working in a company that really is like the one described in the NYT would be crazy to stay. I know I would leave such a company. The cynic in me would interpret this as a tacit invitation by the Bezo-man himself to unhappy employees to beat it and don't let the door hit them on their rears on their way out if they don't like working here but I could be wrong but with the likes of Bezos and Ellison, you shouldn't set the bar really high when it comes to human empathy.

rm_-rf_slash 11y ago

This kind of thing reminded me of when Eric Schmidt justified Google's reputationally low pay by saying "people don't work at Google for the money, they do it to change the world!" Of course, Google's stock made him a billionaire. To me this problem seems to root itself in the absurdity of equity percentages. How is it one who comes to the company a year after founding can work the same 10-12 hour days as a founder and yet see maybe 1% in options they have to pay for while founders expect 15% and up for being there at the beginning? Seems all right when the company is young and the risk is high, but what ends up happening is that the fresh blood 10,20 years on has to fight for scraps while the now-wealthy founders can enjoy their work knowing they could quit tomorrow and never have to lift a finger again. White collar Walmart could pay its employees squarely to compensate for their mental health and social lives, but they act almost allergic to profits as long as they can continue stock offerings to keep prices at a minimum.

dredmorbius 11y ago

Bezos needs to buy some Robert Anton Wilson from himself. Celine's Second Law: Accurate communication is possible only in a non-punishing situation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celine%27s_laws https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celine%27s_laws

vadym909 11y ago

To the people that say an employee should just quit- it isn't that easy. 1. While it may be good for your resume to show you got selected by AMZN, the reverse is it hurts your resume to show you only lasted a few months which may imply it was a hiring mistake and you couldn't cut it. 2. If you took a big relocation package or sign-on bonus, you may feel inclined to stick it out even if it not healthy to not have to pay back and to deflect #1.

fsloth 11y ago

A particularly fitting past discussion in HN about among other things Amazon:https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4195136 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4195136

qihqi 11y ago

As an exAmazonian I think Amazon treated me decently. I ultimately left for some place that treat me even better (with free food and better pay); but I did not believe that I am entitled to those perks. Judging by life of the few Amazonians I know personally, most of them agree with me. I only know one person who complained heavily about Amazon and it is more about his team and having a crappy boss than about the company.

myth_buster 11y ago
but I did not believe that I am entitled to those perks This is the hook as people usually underestimate themselves and this comes into play during salary negotiations too.

MCRed 11y ago

Escalate to HR? That's exactly what I did. Jeff is spinning his typical BS. My boss was abusive, drove off %70 of the team and was dealing drugs to other employees in the PacMed garage. He lied to me many times, and I started documenting it. I went to HR about it, trying to get support so I could transfer out to a team at AWS, where I knew the manager and he had offered me a job. The HR person assured me that everything that I told her would be kept confidential. She insisted I tell her what was going on with my boss, and thus why I wanted to leave. I did tell her, and she then turned around and told my boss all of it. (I didn't tell her he was dealing drugs, I actually felt physically vulnerable to him because he had a violent temper-- his training was to be a prison guard and that's what he wanted to be before somehow he was hired at Amazon to manage programmers despite having difficulty even with simple things like spreadsheets and Excel.) The HR at Amazon is an organization that is a big part of the problem. After she told my boss they started coming up with sudden complaint about my performance and scheduled a meeting with the HR person.. who then talked bout the things I had told her in confidence, in front of my boss (though I knew he already knew) as if there had never been any reason for me to expect confidence. Also, I worked with Jeff Bezos on enough occasions that he knew who I was, and would say hello by name in the hallway. The idea that i could have gone to him directly with a complaint about my boss is asinine in the extreme. He would have passed it on to HR and it would have been the same thing. He might have cared about the drug dealing thing ,but only because it put the company at risk. The lack of empathy, and the rest of the employee hostile corporate culture ORIGINATES with Jeff Bezos. HE is the source and the cause and to him -- and this is a libertarian speaking-- everyone's existence is the sum total of the money they make him. In fact, I think Jeff Bezos is a pathological liar and a psychopath. He's very charming, heartless and able to fake warmth. Clearly he has had PR training too. But he's the evil at the core of Amazon. I've had extensive dealings with Microsoft and Apple and other big companies-- none were any where close to as toxic and heartless as Amazon. Jeff really sees people as resources to be exploited and could not care less about employee development, or retention. In fact, the back stabbing, competitive nature that makes it such a toxic environment is designed in some sort of "survival of the fittest" delusion-- the product is regularly sacrificed (and amazon.com is pretty much a joke how broken it is-- still is, in fact) as a result. You win at Amazon by playing politics, not by being good at your job. PS-- why was I stupid enough to go to HR? I've worked mostly for startups, and it was the job previous to this that was my first real experience with an HR "department" which was one person, who was damn good, and exceptional at mediation and conflict resolution, full of integrity and trustworthy. I didn't have experience at large companies to know that HR was mostly filled with drama addicted flunkies.

eip 11y ago

https://gist.github.com/chitchcock/1281611 https://gist.github.com/chitchcock/1281611 "Ha, ha! You 150-odd ex-Amazon folks here will of course realize immediately that #7 was a little joke I threw in, because Bezos most definitely does not give a shit about your day." "We're talking about a guy who in all seriousness has said on many public occasions that people should be paying him to work at Amazon. He hands out little yellow stickies with his name on them, reminding people "who runs the company" when they disagree with him. The guy is a regular... well, Steve Jobs, I guess. Except without the fashion or design sense. Bezos is super smart; don't get me wrong. He just makes ordinary control freaks look like stoned hippies." "At this point they don't even do it out of fear of being fired. I mean, they're still afraid of that; it's pretty much part of daily life there, working for the Dread Pirate Bezos and all."

ArtDev 11y ago

Most folks know that Amazon warehouses are abusive. Why did it take Mr. Bezos so long to figure this out? He deserves the benefit of the doubt, but its hard to believe he didn't already know.

kdamken 11y ago

I'm always blown away when I read things like this: "Even many Amazonians who have worked on Wall Street and at start-ups say the workloads at the new South Lake Union campus can be extreme: marathon conference calls on Easter Sunday and Thanksgiving, criticism from bosses for spotty Internet access on vacation, and hours spent working at home most nights or weekends." Is this something people are proud of? You're working for a shipping company, how do you get that brainwashed that you sign your life away like that? I understand as you move up the ranks in seniority more is expected of you, but I'm always surprised by the lack of self respect and boundaries people have for themselves in professional environments.

zeruch 11y ago

...except for Jeff's own habits. Now I don't actually have a bad view of Amazon on the whole, but Bezos and his personality is well known for many years as demanding to the point of monomaniacal, and often cowing of others. That isn't just taking a pot shot, that's a repeated observation from many people over many years. It's like saying Larry Ellison likes boats or Scott McNealy hates dentists.