Amazon LP: Frugality : hacking scenario will backfire?
I'll have an interview at Amazon. While preparing for the LP, especially Frugality I have a rather quite awkward story. Once, I was working on the integration of a customer service desk of a well know provider. There was only one official account and multiple consumers in my team. The expected delivery of that feature was 4 weeks. But I went on to exploit a security hack in that famous customer service provider and saved my team 3 weeks while delivering everything in a week. Question is: is this going to backfire because I exploited the system? #engineering #software #swe #Amazon #interview
While this is an example of Frugality, this goes against Earn Trust as it was illegal. Did you raise the exploit to the proper leadership? Or was it kept under the rug?
I asked the permission before proceeding. He agreed. I think the pressure of that feature was high maybe that's why he approved. But, officially it was kept under the rug.
So instead of maintaining integrity, if management says it’s okay, then it’s okay? Have a backbone; disagree and commit.
How is this even a frugality response? Sounds like you risked customer trust in order to deliver results. Without all the details it sounds like a serious flag. You bypassed customer obsession and earning trust just to deliver results. I wouldn't be inclined because you just showed you're not trustworthy at an L5/L6 role. Others may disagree but that's why there is a full loop and debrief.
Well, the account was expensive (500$ something for that admin account ). So I saved some money for the company.
Frugality isnt only about money. $500 is nothing compared to the loss in trust and potential future revenue. You just lowered the bar in Thinking Big as well. Please use this example so you get recycled if you truly believe you did the right thing.
1) I have never seen an LP question on Frugality in my hundreds of interview loops. Doesn't mean it isn't done, but it isn't common. 2) Don't give an answer that highlights something obviously illegal for any LP. Just not a good idea.
Yeah I think frugality is more likely to show up for a management interview same with hire and develop the best (never seen these on a engineering interview)
Thanks @northman. That's a very polite answer. 😊
Just bring a banana with you and when you do the lunch interview just be like "I brought my lunch right here"
That's smart, but it's Virtual onsite 😂😂😂
Oh yeah I forgot about that lol
That's Invent and Simplify, and Bias for Action, and Deliver Results
But is that acceptable? 😬
Depends on what LP you use to justify it, Jeff said Customer Obsession will cover a lot of your other mistakes so who knows
This is not a good answer for frugality - it shows short term thinking, and doesn’t really drive the point home that you really saved anything (legally). I’d vote “no hire” if I were on the loop based on this alone.
Thanks so much for your response. I'll expunge it.
It’s not a good answer for any LP
You can say "I know of a workaround in this integration system we were using, which saved us on admin costs and unblock us from delivering the project. Kind of like you have a trial version of IntelliJ and ultimate version. Instead of using the ultimate version from the start, I used the trial one for 30 days"
I see your point. Thanks mate.
Go back and fix it later. Boom. Earn trust. You saved the ethics of your team
It wasn't a permanent damage or anything. It was just too leverage there team. This story is 3 years old already. I did make sure that everyone deleted everything after the feature.
.Don't share this story. That is a red flag, no hire. Companies want to avoid legal issues, this may have cost your employer millions of dollars.
Thanks so much.
Same question, can someone from Amazon share the table where you have the expectations for each LP
Did you have a similar situation?
No, but I know internally Amazon has a table to rate the answer for LP questions.