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[dupe] Jeff Bezos' email to Amazonians
79 points by Nemant on Aug 17, 2015 | hide | past | favorite | 51 comments
Dear Amazonians,

If you haven't already, I encourage you to give this (very long) New York Times article a careful read:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-wrestling-big-ideas-in-a-bruising-workplace.html

I also encourage you to read this very different take by a current Amazonian:

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/amazonians-response-inside-amazon-wrestling-big-ideas-nick-ciubotariu

Here’s why I’m writing you. The NYT article prominently features anecdotes describing shockingly callous management practices, including people being treated without empathy while enduring family tragedies and serious health problems. The article doesn’t describe the Amazon I know or the caring Amazonians I work with every day. But if you know of any stories like those reported, I want you to escalate to HR. You can also email me directly at [edited]@amazon.com. Even if it's rare or isolated, our tolerance for any such lack of empathy needs to be zero.

The article goes further than reporting isolated anecdotes. It claims that our intentional approach is to create a soulless, dystopian workplace where no fun is had and no laughter heard. Again, I don’t recognize this Amazon and I very much hope you don’t, either. More broadly, I don't think any company adopting the approach portrayed could survive, much less thrive, in today’s highly competitive tech hiring market. The people we hire here are the best of the best. You are recruited every day by other world-class companies, and you can work anywhere you want.

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.

But hopefully, you don't recognize the company described. Hopefully, you’re having fun working with a bunch of brilliant teammates, helping invent the future, and laughing along the way.

Thank you,

Jeff




Full email content previously here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10071600

Also note that the redacted email is not anything special. It's just jeff@, making it a highly dangerous proposition for amazon employes to attempt to send anything there.


Everyone should read Steve Yegge's classic rant about Amazon (vs Google/Facebook)[1], in particular his description of Bezos:

"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."

1. https://plus.google.com/+RipRowan/posts/eVeouesvaVX


The recent NYT story also reminded me of this older Yegge rant, which touches on amazon:

http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2009/04/have-you-ever-legali...

> My stress level began approaching what I might call "Amazon levels", and I don't even work there anymore. Thank God.

> [...] my brother Mike, who was in the Navy on an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf during the 1990s Gulf War, and later worked at Amazon, and declared after four years that Amazon was _way_ more stressful

> [...] astonishingly, we actually managed to launch at least half those crazy ideas, by burning through people like little tea lights.


Every time I read it I'm confused about the first sentence... Does he mean everyone?


I interpret it as "employees are told they [employees] should be paying him [Bezos] for the privilege of being able to work at Amazon, rather than being paid a salary by Amazon".


While true. Most Amazonians don't work with Bezos directly.


I think it's kind of telling that the author of the pro-Amazon blog piece was contacted by "someone internal" (probably his boss or boss's boss) and asked if he had cleared the piece with PR and if he had read the company's social media policy (in my big company experience, that kind of contact is never a good thing).

Presumably he'll be fine now since Bezos is citing his writing, but I can't help but wonder what the "someone internal" would have done otherwise...probably issued some kind of warning about social media.


Yeah it is very telling. Its pretty clear they have a very strong "You must toe the party line in public" policy and that is never a good sign.


True enough, though that's hardly unique to Amazon either. Apple is likewise famous for that.

Really, I'm seeing a bunch of grousing here on HN that doesn't seem to support the NYT allegations at all, which are much more serious.


Yes but I've never worked for such a company and it seems to be mostly "big names" that, frankly, I wouldn't want to work for anyway.

So to me its still "odd".


“Even if it’s rare or isolated, our tolerance for any such lack of empathy needs to be zero,” Mr. Bezos said in an email circulated to all the retailer’s employees.

My note: Zero tolerance policies without recourse for correction are a perfect example of the Amazon inhumanity. Straight from the mouth of the leader. There's your culture problem right there.


"doesn’t describe the Amazon I know " - I've heard that type of excuse used time and time again by higher ups who are actually just shedding responsibility for the culture they've cultivated. It adds insult to injury.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman


A "no true Scotsman" fallacy would be a response like "the people acting this way aren't true to the Amazon spirit".

Instead, the response is "I don't see that happening at Amazon". That's a direct refutation of what's being claimed. Whether you believe it or not is a separate story.


Amazon has built itself a reputation for being a meat grinder, where bright-eyed employees go to be burned out, only to be replaced by another. Even their interview process reflects this sad state of affairs.

That reputation wasn't built overnight, and it won't change overnight, despite what one out-of-touch billionaire says.


Speaking of their interview process, I am occasionally contacted by Amazon recruiters. I always ask them to explain negative reports of their work culture from various sources. I include links. Now I can use a NY Times article!

The recruiter response is, invariably, that the article that I read did not really say what it said, or that the things that I thought were bad are actually good. None of my questions about workplace specifics ever get answered. One of these is always "Do you expect salaried employees to work more than 40 hours per week?"

Seems like that would be an easy one to answer, right? Just say either "no", or "yes" and a specific number. They have never answered directly; it has been equivocating all the way.

So I'm not surprised at all that Bezos would simply deny what is actually happening on his watch, as reported by current and former employees, far below the C-level ranks. As they say, the first obstacle to fixing your problem is admitting you have one.


Their reputation is legendary. Then I met someone that was was hired remotely but for some reason has to fly to Seattle about 1/3 of the year. To each his own, but I prefer to raise my kids instead of showing up for vacations.

It makes it very easy to ignore their phone calls.


I like the idea of getting employees to 'dream big' but pushing their families and personal time to the side or outright eliminating it is a huge problem with companies like Amazon (imo they're not an isolated company as I've heard similar stories from friends who have worked in SV). It just doesn't seem to me that productivity for its own sake is a dangerous precedent since it doesn't pay back to the employees what's lost (time with one's children, spouse, and friends).

Programming is not anything like working on a factory line. On a factory line you fill one tiny task of assembly and/or inspection within an allotted time frame and production quota. Programming it's a matter of analysis even on the most mundane task of bug fixing. Analysis takes a variable amount of time which sometimes over shoots estimates since a problem or a desired feature per business requirements can be found to be novel to the existing codebase. Or sometimes we're lucky as programmers and it's as easy as expanding on a tiny sliver of existing business logic but that isn't a guarantee by any stretch of the imagination.


HN discussion on the original NYT article: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10065243

Earlier response by Tim Bray (who works at Amazon): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10070115


From the pro-Amazon blog:

" because the NYT article is [...] designed to make past data reflect current reality at a company that has done quite a bit to change its ways "

So uhm, "ok we were bad but now we are better, honest!"...


Some parts are very telling (in order):

1. There is no example in the email of nice act(s) that he is personally aware. Just like politicians do, he should have put: "This doesn't describe the Amazon that gave Mr. X two-months paid leave to deal with his wife cancer or when Susan had ...".

2. Threatening tone: If you know of anything escalate to HR or email me. That is some comfort. Dear billionaire: The NYT article reflects 100% of my experience at Amazon. Please help. Best, Insignificant Analyst

3. "... our tolerance ... needs to be zero". Needs to be??? Are we at 20% tolerance level? Why it isn't zero already?

4. "...I don't recognize this Amazon and I very much hope you don't either". Hope??? Are you kidding? Should be: I'm SURE you don't either".

5. "...I don't think any company ...could survive...thrive...in today's highly competitive tech market". Translation: Our stock price tells me we are on the right track so FU NYT.

6. "People we hire here are the best of the best". Err... if you go to a random coffee shop in SF and ask the first 100 people in the door where the best of the best work I bet Amazon would probably account for <3% of the answers.

7. "You are recruited everyday ... you can work anywhere you want." Translation: employment here as at will. If you don't like it there is plenty other places for you to work. So don't even bother sending me that email to me or escalating this to HR. Just leave.

8. "I know I would leave such company." Finished too early the sentence he should have continued: "leave such company, but I can't because IT IS MY COMPANY. When you get your own company and become a billionaire like me you will understand. In the mean time just leave so I can hire another guy just like you.

9. Again, Jeff is full of hope. Should be: I'm sure the Amazon described in the NYT article doesn't exist. We are a fun place to work..."

10. Thank you!!!! Really? The NYT picks you to pieces and you end the email to "rally your troops" with Thank you? No call action, no initiative, no passion, no "let's prove them wrong"???


> I want you to escalate to HR

(to determine if we can safely fire you)


HR works for the company not you. You'd be crazy to escalate anything that could get you fired or demoted to HR.

If you do want to leave, find a job somewhere else, give notice to leave, then at the leaving interview say only nice things, smile, nod, so you don't get screwed on the recommendation call. Then leave.

Once again, HR is not your friend.


It's a trap !


This note from Bezos is cruel, farcical and delusional.

Have we forgotten all the reporting on exploitation of labor in Amazon's supply chain, from the Verge story on how Amazon was having warehouse workers sign 18-month non-complete clauses; through the Independent's account of Amazon's recruitment of neo-Nazi security guards to intimidate immigrant workers working and living in crowded dormitories in Germany; through the Mother Jones first-person account of the soul-crushing and body-destroying conditions inside these same warehouses; through the stories about the 100 degree conditions in some warehouses, where Bezos was too cheap to buy air-conditioning and preferred to have ambulances waiting outside to carry off workers as they dropped from heat exhaustion? (Naked capitalism blog has a good review of all this).

Now we see that this same callous attitude towards "human capital" extends to the white-collar employees in head office, and suddenly everyone is shocked, just shocked, and we get this BS denial from the CEO.

The real story here is the pervasive and intensifying erosion of working conditions (and in fact, wages) for all workers, at all levels of our oligarchical capitalist economy.


The "different take by a current Amazonian" is amusing

- only work there for 18 months - technical bar raiser - engineering leader

If you're one of the chosen ones then Amazon is a great place to work, and its a SDE-driven culture, and if you're on top of that, then life is good.

And the claim that there's no "culling of the herd" is false. Its called top grading. Managers stack rack employees during the annual performance review process and a certain percentage out of any group must be given the lowest reviews and put on "PIPs" (in other words starting the process of firing them).

And I'm a non-anonymous ex-Amazon employee that worked there for 5 years.

The company may not be as bad as the worst examples from the NYT piece, but its far from a good company to work for. Best advice for any current Amazonian is to work there just long enough to get it on your resume and learn stuff, then switch jobs, get more pay and find a better environment.


Jeff Bezos: Out of touch with reality since 1999


I don't think he would be worth $50b if he really was out of touch.


It is likely that he didn't lose his last contact with the reality faced by the commoners until after he built the foundation for that wealth.

At a certain point, personal wealth becomes largely self-perpetuating, without further conscious efforts, and ultra-rich people can also acquire a bubble of intermediaries that insulate them from the commoners and their ordinary problems. They can always afford the durable goods or services that solve those problems effortlessly. And the people around them may simply pre-emptively order those solutions on their behalf before the problem actually manifests.

The skills you need to earn your living expenses when you already have $50G are very different from those you need when you have $50.


There are plenty of out of touch billionaire dinosaurs. Google Sheldon Adelson. Google Robert Kraft. He remains 100% convinced that nobody below him has ever violated any rules or cheated. Having billions of dollars is the quickest path to becoming an out of touch dinosaur.


There is a danger as an individual ascends whatever latter of success to believe that they are there because they are right and everyone else is wrong. The linear nature money makes this measurement becomes especially problematic. If someone falls in to this trap it will be evident because they begin to have trouble solving problems, or they solve them in disastrous ways. Many, many examples especially if you look outside the U.S. at countries with high corruption levels. (In the U.S. too with very high profile con men and tax evaders.)


Out of touch with what? I think the person who is out of touch with reality is the person who doesn't know how to get what they want from reality. And who doesn't want " 1 billion dollars " ?


I don’t, especially when you experience the things you will have to do to get it and keep it.

You might want to read some thoughts from a guy named Siddhartha. Craving a billion dollars is just going to make you miserable until you get it, and then when you have it you will crave another billion or something equally toxic to your well being.

Money and spending it is just another kind of drug. Once you have it and all the stuff you can buy with it you will become an addict. You will then crave a new and bigger high trying to acquire or spend even more of it. You know what kind of stuff junkies do to get a fix, billionaires are pretty similar, hence this topic we are discussing here today.

Its way better to stay grounded, do the things you love, and enjoy life. If you can make a billion doing that then you probably should take it, but it shouldn’t be your goal in life unless you want to turn in to a complete ass.


Wanting it is one thing. Do you have the skill to get it is another? People talk a lot of trash excusing themselves for not having the skill to get it, pretending that they never wanted it. You only have the luxury of the choice you talk of, when you really have that choice, when you could make that billion, and then you renounce it. Otherwise, it's just kidding yourself. Think on that, grasshopper.


So true. There is certainly skill involved, one of them is almost certainly the ability and willingness to exploit your fellow human beings. I'm completely lacking in that skill so, woe is me, I will never make a billion.

It seems I will have to settle for doing the things I love, enjoying life, as I strive to avoid screwing people.

You do seem to be the sensei of trolldom and to have found your one true skill.


> And who doesn't want " 1 billion dollars " ?

I don't. I want to do good, do well, and be respected and loved by the people I care about. Enough money to not worry about things would be nice, and that's basically what I'm working towards. A billion dollars is not necessary for that.


Well if you can get that from reality -- that's your "$1b" -- if you can get what you want, that is the key, is it not? :)

Who doesn't want success may be a more apt way of putting it. Or even, who __wants__ to be frustrated and __not__ get what they want?


Translation:

"If you haven't already, I encourage you to give this (very long) New York Times article a careful read"

- I can't stop you from reading it so go ahead, we have nothing to hide. It's "very long" ie. No one has time to read it all and you shouldn't either/it's of bad quality and could easily be summarized.

"I also encourage you to read this very different take by a current Amazonian:"

- said article has no merit versus an article written by someone who actually works here. Never mind the bias.

"Here’s why I’m writing you. The NYT article prominently features anecdotes describing shockingly callous management practices, including people being treated without empathy while enduring family tragedies and serious health problems. The article doesn’t describe the Amazon I know or the caring Amazonians I work with every day. But if you know of any stories like those reported, I want you to escalate to HR. You can also email me directly at [edited]@amazon.com. Even if it's rare or isolated, our tolerance for any such lack of empathy needs to be zero."

- these are bizarre isolated cases, empathy must be respected. Probably because there are serious legal ramifications for us if we don't so donth take it elsewhere, raise internally so we can make it go away. Also note that I dont mention working you to a pulp on weekends etc. Fuck you. You're here to satisfy my "vision".

"The article goes further than reporting isolated anecdotes. It claims that our intentional approach is to create a soulless, dystopian workplace where no fun is had and no laughter heard. Again, I don’t recognize this Amazon and I very much hope you don’t, either. More broadly, I don't think any company adopting the approach portrayed could survive, much less thrive, in today’s highly competitive tech hiring market. The people we hire here are the best of the best. You are recruited every day by other world-class companies, and you can work anywhere you want."

- again, isolated cases so all good. You better not think like that, you're an "amazonian" we're fucking hard to get into, we're "world class". You should be thankful we gave you a chance. We THRIVE mother fucker are you a loser or an amabot?

"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.

But hopefully, you don't recognize the company described. Hopefully, you’re having fun working with a bunch of brilliant teammates, helping invent the future, and laughing along the way."

- if you feel like that get out. We don't care. Get out. But if you don't, you're a winner who laughs at working your life away for me while I amaze myself at what people will do to remain "winning".


Does it piss anyone else off that he uses the term anecdote? 'I was forced to go back to work the day after my miscarriage' What an anecdote! Just makes me believe that he is a megalomaniac and a bit of a psychopath.


I'd rather hear laughter from the actual employees than the CEO.


Words are cheap. (Unless priced by the agency model on kindle).


> So true. There is certainly skill involved, one of them is almost certainly the ability and willingness to exploit your fellow human beings. I'm completely lacking in that skill so, woe is me, I will never make a billion. . .

If you want to pretend you’re the noble righteous fake victim of other’s exploitations, and if you want to pretend that people who are really successful are “evil” and their success is somehow fake as it’s founded on exploiting people, you’re just suckling to the disempowering lie that so many people delude themselves with : instead of taking responsibility for your success, and believing, correctly, that it is about the choices you make, you look at the successful, choose jealously over inspiration, and instead of creating improvements to better your situation, you delude yourself with fabrications to diminish their success and make you feel better, closing the perceived gap between you lack of success and their success, not by taking real action that could create results for you, but by believing these lies for the fake pay off of pretending others are “wrong” and you are “right”.

It’s sad you fell back onto this fake victim delusion, instead of choosing to take responsibility for your life and create improvements that could lead to results for you. And it’s sad that you saw in my sincere words trolling, what’s triggered for you there is what you bring to it, and what’s triggered for you is your responsibility, it’s got nothing to do with me. Pretending it does is just being a fake victim, again, instead of taking responsibility.


> your entire post is a pretty damning conviction of yourself. I feel sorry for you.

Not really. I'm not substituting hating on others success and pretending it's "evil" as a substitute for actually taking responsibility, creating improvements and getting results.

That's what I'm pointing out critics of Amazon are deluding themselves with, and this attitude, the fake victim attitude, the I-don't-have-a-choice attitude, is fundamentally disempowering. It's the very cause of their purported disempowerment, and it's not going to help them achieve results, or create improvements -- leading them to have more things to complain about, which, unworkably, they blame on others.


> Your entire post is a pretty damning conviction of yourself. I feel sorry for you.

I'm pretty sure you don't know me, and I get that you're comfortable offering your certain opinion of me based on not actually knowing me, tho I don't want that to dismiss what you said because this leads to a very important point.

Speak about anything you care about -- not just the things you feel you are immune to judgement on yourself.

This is so important.

in other words, if i'm only going to express an opinion on subjects i'm safe from judgement on, that doesn't make me a very reliable source ( huge personal bias ) and i'm choosing to try to protect my ego ( and also not challenge myself in what could be opportunities for improvement ) instead of saying something inspiring with regards to ways improvements could be made in general.

if i did that id be choosing ego and me over contributing to technology and progress and success. that doesn't work.

it's pretty simple. i believe in technology, humanity and progress and success, and i see clearly a lot of the ways that people limit themselves and their thinking and sometimes i choose to say something about it. a reason contributing to that choice is because i care about these things, and it works for people to work on them, and if you are not working on them, not because you're not capable but because your perspective doesn't work, then theres a big opportunity for improvement, that sometimes i choose to contribute to meeting with what i say.

i know i pick the subjects that get the most pushback, and a reason contributing to this for me is because this is the ones that are holding people back the most, the ones that are most important and where people are most stuck by the clarity missing from the ways they are getting in their own way. it's like the importance of working on the big opportunities, if you only pick the areas where there are small safe bets, you think small and the results you get will be small.

so in contributing to the meta opportunity of the psychology with which people approach this work, just like with the opportunities in tech themselves, if you choose to contribute to the area with the riskiest biggest bets the results you get will be the greatest.

what i am doing by pushing back here in the middle of controversy is the very essence of what we do as founders.


People will hate.

If their opinion was worth 1 fucking dollar -- then Amazon wouldn't be.

Then Bezos wouldn't be.

People vote with their aspirations and their payments every fucking day.

Who cares what some jaded loser writers put towards their credo of anti-corporate injustice fabrication?

It just perpetuates their deluded worldview and makes it easier for them to deal with the suffering they endured from their own choices that left them without a cent. And they're jealous, and they go to invent an evil, to pretend they're right, to make them feel better, about not having any proof of how "right" they feel they are.

The one's who are "right" -- they have the money. Because they understood what reality is.

It's simple.

[ Hello to everyone -- I will take your hate all day and make it awesome. I know there's a lot of delusion triggered by this article, especially when someone pushes back against the compelling fake view that a hugely successful company is "evil" -- bring it, I am here to help you see clearly. Please tho, keep it here, abusive emails will be published. ]


> The one's who are "right" -- they have the money. Because they understood what reality is.

Your entire post is a pretty damning conviction of yourself. I feel sorry for you.


If I tar myself with the same brush -- what of it ? If what I say is correct, even if I express the same dysfunctional pattern, what of it? The fact that I may or may not see it in myself doesn't affect my ability to see it in other people.

I don't require your pity, I accept it tho, if that's what you want to give. It just makes you feel better. Feeling sorry for someone is a way to make yourself feel better than them, revealing your own insecurity.

I'm always looking to learn and for opportunities to improve. Could what I describe of others be something I do ? Of course.

At least I have the courage to say it, perhaps knowing that I exhibit it still. Willing to learn. I am. Are you?

Start where you are. Or you'll never get where you want to be.

Struggling against blaming others, instead of taking responsibility, struggling against doing, instead of hating, is something anyone can encounter. The point is, to see you have a choice, and choose something that works.

If you want to pretend you're already above that, and look down on me, the very need to look down on me shows me you aren't. If you were past this, and I wasn't, you'd help me with it. That's what you do when you've been through something.

When you haven't been through it, you can be afraid of it, and you accuse others of it to deny it of yourself. Because you haven't yet owned up to dealing with it yet.

That's the mechanism. That's what going on here.

So maybe your statement was just a damning accusation of you.

If you're gonna get personal you got to be prepared for how that reflects on you.


I think you might be missing the point here. There are lots of reports, from many different sources, that Amazon has an aggressive high-pressure work culture. It's not really a secret, and the existence of this approach is pretty legendary. It's not like this is the first report of it.


The point, depends, on where you are standing. And unless you are me, you're standing somewhere slightly different. Skepticism. So unsatisfying...like a cop out. Far better to barge ahead pretending that your POV is the one true way. So satisfying. The satisfaction of that pay off indicates that it must be adaptive -- pretending you're right and seeming to win arguments must lead to more sex ( to produce babies that also pretend they are right ). Regardless of whether your points have any actual merit or not, the point is to seem as if they do. So, don't you see, we are all dancing to the beat of our genes, clothed in the mere colours of reason? History is written by the victors, in no case is that truer than evolution. I believe it works to be more than your genes. There is a truth that exists outside of the theatrics of winning debates. Yet perhaps such a truth is out of reach of and irrelevant to, mere humans ? I choose to believe it is not. Haha.


What the fuck does this even mean.


It means people invent invectives to satisfy their own deluded psychologies, independent of any merits of what they say. They fabricate narratives that make it easier for them to live with themselves, and disown responsibility, in favour of incorrectly trying to blame someone else.

Frequently the target of their blame is someone ( or something ) successful, since this has the most pay off for them. It has the most pay off for them because the large difference in success between themselves and their target gives them the most serious dissatisfaction, which they seek to correct, not by taking actions which may improve their situation, but by believing delusions which may diminish the difference that so vexes them.

So the hater tries to pretend that the successful is "wrong", and this makes them feel doubly right, in that they are "better" than the one who is objectively better than they ( by being "right" and the other "wrong" ), and, further than that, that even the objective measure of success is itself somehow flawed, because they purport it to be founded on a great injustice which they fabricate for the very purpose of making themselves feel that much less inadequate in comparison.

It's a highly compelling, and widespread addictive delusion, because it's like a drug. People get the feeling of success and achievement without actually doing anything to achieve that. They get the neurotransmitter dump, simply by fabricating for themselves a delusion ( their hate filled invective ) in which the successful is not, and they are right.

The tricky part is separating all this from what is actually true. Separating the narrative, from the what is.




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