Terrible places to work - Amazon

Elessar

So the New York Times published an article recently about the abhorrent work practices and treatment of staff at Amazon. I would highly recommend a read - some of the things going on are incredible.

Some choice quotes:

At Amazon, workers are encouraged to tear apart one another’s ideas in meetings, toil long and late (emails arrive past midnight, followed by text messages asking why they were not answered), and held to standards that the company boasts are “unreasonably high. "Amazon is where overachievers go to feel bad about themselves". “When you’re not able to give your absolute all, 80 hours a week, they see it as a major weakness.”

Amazon employees are held accountable for a staggering array of metrics, a process that unfolds in what can be anxiety-provoking sessions called business reviews, held weekly or monthly among various teams. A day or two before the meetings, employees receive printouts, sometimes up to 50 or 60 pages long, several workers said. At the reviews, employees are cold-called and pop-quizzed on any one of those thousands of numbers.

Everyone has access to the "Anytime Feedback Tool," which lets employees criticize or praise their coworkers discretely. The feedback makes it to upper management, and can often be used in Amazon's standard weekly or monthly performance reviews. Employees are also routinely ranked, and managers are forced to fire a certain amount of the lowest-scoring workers every time to fulfill quotas.

Perhaps worst of all is Amazon's approach when its employees need help. The Times has uncovered several cases where workers who were sick, grieving, or otherwise encumbered by the realities of life were pushed out of the company. A woman who had a miscarriage was told to travel on a business trip the day after both her twins were stillborn. Another woman recovering from breast cancer was given poor performance rankings and was warned that she was in danger of losing her job.

Sounds like an absolute nightmare workplace. I value my myself and my self worth too much to work in a place like that. Has anyone ever worked for a similar company here?

mickydoomsux

Multinationals are terrible companies to work for in the main.

jimgoose

No. And someone would be getting a belt of a pickaxe-handle if I did. Lunatics.

Massimo Cassagrande

Happily no. Also, happily, I never intend working for Amazon. God invented a simple phrase which can protect you totally from employers like that- "Fcuk off."

jimgoose

mickydoomsux wrote: »

Multinationals are terrible companies to work for in the main.

Not in my experience. There are a certain amount of head-case outfits, though.

Snake Plisken

Yeah reminds me of a certain cpu manufacturer's Focal process!

jaymcg91

Multinations on the whole don't sound great but Amazon take it to the next level - even if you read the comments section in the NYT you'll ex employees and people who have worked with Amazon before saying how awful they are.

The way they make out that they're changing the world - guys you're figuring out how to get toilet roll to somebody 17 minutes quicker - get over yourselves.

A woman who had breast cancer was told that she was put on a “performance improvement plan” — Amazon code for “you’re in danger of being fired” — because “difficulties” in her “personal life” had interfered with fulfilling her work goals. Their accounts echoed others from workers who had suffered health crises and felt they had also been judged harshly instead of being given time to recover.

Awful.

Wacker The Attacker

Oi Amazon Faaaaack off

TallGlass

Once the CEO is rich and the governments get some tax and there are jobs created no one gives a ****.

The CEO of Amazons net worth is 34.7 billion USD, I am sure he could easily put 4.7 billion into making his company a great place to work and pay everyone a fair wage and the guy would still be worth 30 billion.

But these bastards a too greedy to spend an extra 10$, fair enough when Amazon was starting out or what ever, cash might have been tight, but there is no excuse now at the moment and its just ****ing greedy.

Sure also look at Tesco, billions wrote off this year and last year and there still doing really well, that money could have been giving to employees but nah as usual greedy bastards at the top.

biko

Just don't apply to work there then.
Stop enabling **** companies.

kneemos

Impossible to buy anything on Amazon due to extortionate postal fees.
Maybe they could work on that in their next tare down meeting,or whatever they're called.

Nodin

Elessar wrote: »

.............
Sounds like an absolute nightmare workplace. I value my myself and my self worth too much to work in a place like that. Has anyone ever worked for a similar company here?

Saw something on how they run their warehouse, and even on that level it seemed kafka-esque. I've worked for a large dysfunctional company, but in theory it wasn't meant to be that way, and you could shield yourself in ways.

Banjo String

I hear working in the Amazon is fierce harsh and dangerous.

Mozzies are relentless, stifling beat, dangerous pygmy tribes, poisonous snakes, poisonous tree frogs, jaguars, but the biggest fcuk off of the lot goes to them wee fish yokes that swim up your japs eye when you're swimming in the water, they get right up the little soldier, and then wedge themselves there with two little barbs, making every piss from there on in feel like your passing broken glass.

Amazon me hole.

The_Valeyard

Sounds like a North Korean work camp

The Backwards Man

Tame enough.

Do you all work in cotton wool factories?

There was also a report that one of their factories gets so hot that they have medics stationed near all the exits, to take care of anyone that suffers from the heat, instead of paying for A/C.

Specialun

Worked in multi nationals for years..pay well but shocking work cultures..some disgracefull things happened in some

Oafley Jones

Jeff Bezos believes that conflict is good for business. And that's how his company is set-up. I'd say he'd easily beat out Jobs for "Worlds biggest Arsehole CEO of the modern Age". And Jobs was an utter ****.

biko

Let me know when their suicide rate exceeds that of Apple.

The_Valeyard

biko wrote: »

Let me know when their suicide rate exceeds that of Apple.

Foxconn?

matrim

I've read the reports about poor conditions in their warehouses but anyone I know working in their Ireland office seem to like it. Maybe a difference between their different sections.

Their interview process is a pain. I applied to them before and had 3 phone interviews with the guys from the US, 2 with guys in Ireland and was about to progress to a face to face interview when I got offered a different job so didn't bother to continue with Amazon because there were supposed to be at least 2 more rounds

Clem H Fandango

biko wrote: »

Let me know when their suicide rate exceeds that of Apple.

Not Apple, Foxconn, one of the suppliers of components to many other companies such as Samsung, Huawei and LG.
That is like saying KFC has a high suicide rate because chicken farmers are off topping themselves.

Graham

The_Valeyard wrote: »

Foxconn?

Foxconn that also build the Amazon Fire and at least some of the Kindles.

Nodin

Oafley Jones wrote: »

Jeff Bezos believes that conflict is good for business. And that's how his company is set-up. I'd say he'd easily beat out Jobs for "Worlds biggest Arsehole CEO of the modern Age". And Jobs was an utter ****.

"Google" might have its benefits but from what I heard it was less than pleasant in that sense as well.

Rabo Karabekian

biko wrote: »

Just don't apply to work there then.
Stop enabling **** companies.

Yeah, it's the employees that are the problem here.

Elessar

Nodin wrote: »

"Google" might have its benefits but from what I heard it was less than pleasant in that sense as well.

Yeah I personally know a few lads that work in Google and it's not all roses and free dinners. There's a tonne of pressure to meet targets, I know one lad who had a breakdown with the stress. Makes you think, especially when you work in IT yourself..

Oafley Jones

Nodin wrote: »

"Google" might have its benefits but from what I heard it was less than pleasant in that sense as well.

Huge hours but it's actually fine. Lots and lots of perks to keep you hooked. Apple is fine as well. Less perks and pay compared to Google. Amazon is toxic at every level. Although I've heard the call centre in cork is okay.

Berserker

biko wrote: »

Just don't apply to work there then.

Easier said than done. I work in IT and companies here, small and large, promise you the sun, moon and stars to get you in the door but it becomes apparent pretty quickly that they are a disaster to work for. You can't walk out the door for a few months or it will reflect badly on you when you start interviewing for a new job, which means that you end up stuck in a nightmare job for six months or so. IT consultancy and American IT resourcing companies are ones to avoid from my experience. I have heard some horror stories where developers have been up working until 4am. If the developer doesn't meet these demands then they are not "engaged".

Word spreads about these companies after a while but you can still get stung with a new company that enters the market. I 've been caught myself. I run a mile when I hear a company say that they are "fun" places to work. I tend to avoid companies that like to bring lunch, dinner etc into the office for you as a "treat" too.

yes there

Tried to recruit me during the summer but was well are of their working conditions although they did a good job at tempting me. This just confirms it.

Ruu

No, but they keep opening more and more fulfillment centers across the US. Now wheres my order!!!

Heroditas

Snake Plisken wrote: »

Yeah reminds me of a certain cpu manufacturer's Focal process!

I was thinking exactly the same thing. Get an IR there in the Irish site and they'll pretty much show you the door. In the US, you're fired.

Nodin

Elessar wrote: »

Yeah I personally know a few lads that work in Google and it's not all roses and free dinners. There's a tonne of pressure to meet targets, I know one lad who had a breakdown with the stress. Makes you think, especially when you work in IT yourself..

Team vs team, one hand played against the other kind of thing was what was intimated to me. Didn't like the sound of it meself. Theres enough conflict in high stress enviroments without setting it up, IMO.

Oafley Jones wrote:

Huge hours but it's actually fine. Lots and lots of perks to keep you hooked. Apple is fine as well. Less perks and pay compared to Google. Amazon is toxic at every level. Although I've heard the call centre in cork is okay.

True. At least its not one of those ones where you're hoping it will pay off down the road, only discover that you (and the rest) are essentially being shafted.

Squidgy Black

Work in the same building as their main office in Dublin, anyone I've spoken to says the same thing, long hours and impossible deadlines and workloads.

Betty Bloggs

I watched a BBC Panorama special about Amazon called "The Truth behind the Click" where they got a guy with a hidden camera to go and work in one of their UK warehouses. Seems like such a horrible place to work.
Only half an hour long and worth a watch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXWJ4GfQ22E

Wanderer2010

Im glad i dont work in a place with such a bad culture and conditions for employees. My job is a cake walk compared to some places. Im in a multi national but the longer Im here, the more I learn that almost all, if not all, of HR policies are complete fabrication and exist only to cover themselves legally. Ive seen good workers pushed out of their jobs because they work for a bully who thrives on power trips and ego massages. Ive seen bullies in the office allowed free reign because they play soccer with the boss and are therefore untouchable. Ive seen people harassed, ignored, ideas robbed and policies falsified on a daily basis, all in the name of keeping a united front.

If you make a company money then sadly it doesnt matter what kind of a person you are or how you make your employees feel.

conorhal

This is a product of the hideous libertarian capitalist culture practiced by MNCs and increasingly adopted by business across the globe.
The model is minimal management under huge pressure to deliver growth targets that bare no relation to market demand because they are often set up for failure to ensure target bonuses aren't paid.
People are mere corporate assets to be measured by metrics that rarely relate to an individuals actual job.

This is combined with a corporate culture that really puts the 'cult' in corporate cult-ure. Google encourage employees to work, rest and play... at their desk, with all night tech crunch pizza parties and all night 'innovation jam's'.
That of course doesn't leave much room for going home to feed the kids and read them a bedtime story, but then Google would rather you freeze your eggs on the company and not have any. Some applauded the offer of Google to give employees access to freeze eggs but most recognised this 'generous employee benefit' for what it was, a stunt that implicitly warned female employees to think twice about their prospects if they took maternity leave

Ultimately it's corporate culture that is designed to dehumanize employees and has no consideration for their work life balance because it just sees employees as meat for the grinder.
They have effectively taken the worst of Wall St. culture with it's aggressive, bullying, alpha-male excess and unleashed it on people packing boxes.

Cold War Kid

That's Amazon America though - I'd say it's not as bad here (but no picnic either). One person told me awful things about being temp staff at Amazon Cork (and in fairness, you don't have employee protection as a temp) but any permanent staff seem to get on fine there.

Massimo Cassagrande wrote: »

Happily no. Also, happily, I never intend working for Amazon. God invented a simple phrase which can protect you totally from employers like that- "Fcuk off."

Yeah if you've a mortgage and work there, just tell them to **** off. If only it were so simple.
You should look for another job though, but that isn't always so straightforward - might be difficult to get the time off to do interviews for a start.

biko wrote: »

Just don't apply to work there then.
Stop enabling **** companies.

The Backwards Man wrote: »

Tame enough.

Do you all work in cotton wool factories?

biko wrote: »

Let me know when their suicide rate exceeds that of Apple.

not going against the grain for the sake of it at all. It might feel cool to blame the employees for working there, but nah... it's those running the show and mistreating staff that are the ones to blame.

The Randy Riverbeast

Nodin wrote: »

"Google" might have its benefits but from what I heard it was less than pleasant in that sense as well.

A few of these US multinationals are like this. They bring over the culture of if you dont sacrifice yourself to save the photocopier in a fire then you arent a team player. Monday night is game night after we sacrifice our first borns.

At least google has some perks to make you more likely to stay.

kneemos

conorhal wrote: »

This is a product of the hideous libertarian capitalist culture practiced by MNCs and increasingly adopted by business across the globe.
The model is minimal management under huge pressure to deliver growth targets that bare no relation to market demand because they are often set up for failure to ensure target bonuses aren't paid.
People are mere corporate assets to be measured by metrics that rarely relate to an individuals actual job.

This is combined with a corporate culture that really puts the 'cult' in corporate cult-ure. Google encourage employees to work, rest and play... at their desk, with all night tech crunch pizza parties and all night 'innovation jam's'.
That of course doesn't leave much room for going home to feed the kids and read them a bedtime story, but then Google would rather you freeze your eggs on the company and not have any. Some applauded the offer of Google to give employees access to freeze eggs but most recognised this 'generous employee benefit' for what it was, a stunt that implicitly warned female employees to think twice about their prospects if they took maternity leave

Ultimately it's corporate culture that is designed to dehumanize employees and has no consideration for their work life balance because it just sees employees as meat for the grinder.

STRIKE !!!

Ave Sodalis

Elessar wrote: »

Has anyone ever worked for a similar company here?

Worked somewhere as bad, if not worse. It wasn't a company though, and for the most part an industry wide problem as opposed to a particular employer.

Nodin

Wanderer2010 wrote: »

Im glad i dont work in a place with such a bad culture and conditions for employees. My job is a cake walk compared to some places. Im in a multi national but the longer Im here, the more I learn that almost all, if not all, of HR policies are complete fabrication and exist only to cover themselves legally. Ive seen good workers pushed out of their jobs because they work for a bully who thrives on power trips and ego massages. Ive seen bullies in the office allowed free reign because they play soccer with the boss and are therefore untouchable. Ive seen people harassed, ignored, ideas robbed and policies falsified on a daily basis, all in the name of keeping a united front.

If you make a company money then sadly it doesnt matter what kind of a person you are or how you make your employees feel.

I know that hymn quite well. Company I worked for had a massive turnover of staff in accounts for years. Got to the stage where any of the higher positions had to be hired via ads in the papers, as agencies wouldn't send anyone over.

Eventually, a financial controller handed in his notice, and the one second to him realised she'd be dropped in his job (and thus in the slot in the firing line) and handed hers in on the same day two hours later. CEO called them up, had words. He then asked the financial director about it - next thing I heard, the two were staying, there'd been an emergency board meeting and they got rid of her.

I remarked to one of the other directors that it had taken them long enough (as this one had a notorious history). The reply was that her mistake had not been the two going in the one day, but the way she spoke to the CEO when questioned about it - essentially that was ok for the "little folk" but not for the big chief, who knew full well what the atmosphere was like down there (she had actually been moved to the top floor away from a/c's years before in the belief that physical distance might lessen the savagery).

Berserker

sup_dude wrote: »

Worked somewhere as bad, if not worse. It wasn't a company though, and for the most part an industry wide problem as opposed to a particular employer.

Care to name the industry?

JONJO THE MISER

Some people think keeping a Job is the be all and end all of life, thus these people are taken for a ride by bad employers.

Ave Sodalis

Berserker wrote:

Care to name the industry?

Sport horse, grooming in particular

Cold War Kid

JONJO THE MISER wrote: »

Some people think keeping a Job is the be all and end all of life, thus these people are taken for a ride by bad employers.

More that they don't have the choice not to work. You can look for a new job (which people unhappy in their job are obviously going to do) but you can't leave the awful one until it's in stone that you have the new one.

Some posts on this thread are deflecting responsibility for ill-treatment onto the employee, instead of seeing the responsibility as lying with the ruthless employer.

conorhal

A good example of this is what happened in a major German tech firm (who's name I won't mention).
The bean counters looked at all the metrics and discovered that their support teams were only busy about two thirds of the time.
In the infinite wisdom of those that sit in boardrooms utterly divorced from what actually happens on the front line (like General Melchitt from Blackadder Goes Forth) they decided that obviously money could be saved by getting rid of a third of their helpdesk.

Well it doesn't take a mensa member to work out what happened next.

Firstly, if you're 100% busy there is not extra capacity for a major incident, so when they happen customers face increased wait times and break fix times and you just end up with unhappy customers.
You also end up with stressed out employees. Sick leave went through the roof further reducing capacity and increasing the stress on already overburdened employees.
That meant all the talent left and with it went years of experience only to be replaced with a constant churn of employees without experience and that inevitably further hacked off customers.

In the end they had to restore staffing levels to their previous numbers. It was a costly lesson for the company in just how damaging management by spreadsheet can be.

Nodin

Cold War Kid wrote: »

More that they don't have the choice not to work. You can look for a new job (which people unhappy in their job are obviously going to do) but you can't leave the awful one until it's in stone that you have the new one............

Not to mention the fear suffered by those supporting children, a mortgage, possibly as the sole earner in a household....it's less than pretty.

Zascar

mickydoomsux wrote: »

Multinationals are terrible companies to work for.

Rubbish. That's a terrible generalisation. I've worked for 4 Multinational IT companies. Yes you have to work hard - but absolutely nothing like these stories of Amazon. In all but one I worked 9-5 or thereabouts, maybe stay late once in a while. There was pressure, but nothing that would affect your health or mental state.

I know a number of people who work for Amazon here in Dublin - mostly sales and some developers. Again, they are worked hard and the pressure is on if you are not performing - but that's the same in any of the main IT companies. Google, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin etc.

The one thing you have to remember is that Americans have a totally different work ethic than we do. I had an American boss in my last job and he once said to me "I think it's great how you guys have this 'work life balance' thing - but back home, your life starts when your work is finished'. They don't understand the 9-5, they barely get any holidays or sick leave, and they can be fired for practically no reason. Things are very very different here.

One eyed Jack

I think what's missing here though is context, and given that Amazon, Google, Apple, Microsoft employ in the hundreds of thousands of employees, you're no doubt going to get a high percentage who are unsatisfied, unfulfilled and underwhelmed with their conditions of employment. The culture in these companies really is ruthless, because it has to be to compete in today's environment where the consumer or the client is only interested in the end product or service and getting value for their money (Apple are the king of producing shiny turds, but they are unquestionably the market leader in mobile devices because of their business practices and marketing strategy).

Anyone familiar with management systems will have learned about Taylorism and how it has evolved over decades and even now American companies are adopting strategies to compete with the Japanese, from the Japanese.

The rewards though for those who want them are there, and the rewards are fantastic, you can negotiate your own salary and the bonuses if you hit your metrics are impressive. It's a cut-throat and competitive culture, and by no means is it for everyone, but for those people that thrive in that environment, and they are few and far between, you won't hear them complain about their working conditions.

That's not to say that those employees who don't thrive in that environment don't sometimes have valid grievances in those circumstances, but you'll find the same culture is often present in many companies, whether they are a small company with 10 employees, or a large company with 1,000,000 employees.

osarusan

One eyed Jack wrote: »

but you'll find the same culture is often present in many companies, whether they are a small company with 10 employees, or a large company with 1,000,000 employees.

I agree with this - business people who think that being a total c**t to their employees is necessary to be, or even synonymous with being, a top businessperson come in companies of all shapes and sizes.

conorhal

Zascar wrote: »

Rubbish. That's a terrible generalisation. I've worked for 4 Multinational IT companies. Yes you have to work hard - but absolutely nothing like these stories of Amazon. In all but one I worked 9-5 or thereabouts, maybe stay late once in a while. There was pressure, but nothing that would affect your health or mental state.

I know a number of people who work for Amazon here in Dublin - mostly sales and some developers. Again, they are worked hard and the pressure is on if you are not performing - but that's the same in any of the main IT companies. Google, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin etc.

The one thing you have to remember is that Americans have a totally different work ethic than we do. I had an American boss in my last job and he once said to me "I think it's great how you guys have this 'work life balance' thing - but back home, your life starts when your work is finished'. They don't understand the 9-5, they barely get any holidays or sick leave, and they can be fired for practically no reason. Things are very very different here.

I've not worked for any US firms but know quite a few that have. Yes things are very different, but according those I know, they are actually horribly inefficient. There's a huge amount of time wasted 'looking busy at your desk at ten O' clock at night' but no real increase in productivity. If they worked 9 to 5 they'd get no less work done in the experience of many of my friends that work under such regimes.

Volkswagen actually cut off employee access to their Blackberry e-mail out of hours to put a break on the unproductive corporate culture of the 'last man in the office' nonsense.