The New York Times dug deep Saturday into Amazon's work culture, and the results aren't pretty. They interviewed more than 100 current and former employees, many of whom had damning things to say. Conference calls on national holidays and the expectation of constant WiFi access on vacation don't even scrape the surface.
"Nearly every person I worked with, I saw cry at their desk," said Bo Olson, a former Amazonian who worked in book marketing.
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Of all of his management notions, perhaps the most distinctive is his belief that harmony is often overvalued in the workplace — that it can stifle honest critique and encourage polite praise for flawed ideas. Instead, Amazonians are instructed to "disagree and commit"...to rip into colleagues' ideas, with feedback that can be blunt to the point of painful, before lining up behind a decision. [The New York Times]
The report also points out Amazon's top leadership team is all men. Several female employees said they felt pushed out of the company after creating work schedules around childcare, tending to ill relatives, or even recovering from cancer, miscarriages, and other health concerns. And fathers are out of luck, too: The company doesn't offer paid paternity leave.
Amazon's high turnover rate is starting to make a lot of sense. Read the full report here.
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