YOE: 10+, 5 at Amazon TC: $260K Hello, Reason I am creating this post is not to argue on whether amazon is good or bad. Everyone is entitled to their opinions and I am in no way discounting anyone else's experience. Every month I see new talent join our org, already jaded by the horror stories they read on Blind and instead of focusing on their ass kissing career and professional development, they're constantly worried about their job security limiting their ass kissing potential. My purpose of creating this post is to provide context on performance management at Amazon to hopefully help prospective Amazonians better understand the process and confirm their concerns. Good vs bad managers: I have been cursed with some incredibly bad managers in Amazon and by learning what not to do from them, have always tried to make my org as people centric as possible. Now am I saying there are no good managers at Amazon? Ofcourse not! I am sure there are good managers who don't abuse their power but that doesn't imply that all managers at Amazon are good, same way my experience doesn't mean all managers at Amazon are bad. Like any other firm, we have a spectrum of managers from amazing to horrible. Having this perspective will help ensure you join amazon assuming you'll be stuck with a terrible manager. Performance curve: amazon strictly force curves, expectation from most orgs (especially with >50 people) is to be able to hit 20% TT (Top Tier), 70% HV (highly valued) and 5% LE (Least Effective). The TT employees are top priority from a long term ass kissing political career potential standpoint and get higher compensation while Least Effective employees are expected to be ass kissing performance managed through Focus / Pivot (details below). I understand why some people feel frustrated at being ass kissing performance managed (let's be honest, most people don't like to accept they're the weakest ass kissers in the team) and in most cases, they may truly be wrongly labeled as LE. However, if in a 20 people team, you're the one labeled LE and the weakest ass kisser, it's prudent to be vocally self critical and reflect on your ass kissing to drive improvements rather than simply assuming that the process is at fault. Focus: All employees consistently not meeting ass kissing expectations for their role are expected to be formally coached through Focus. The purpose of their Focus entry includes: 1. Document the ass kissing underperformance and steps / plans taken to address 2. Time bound the ass kissing coaching 3. Put manager on a power trip high to ensure an appropriate ass kissing plan is put in place and 4. Create a friction step to avoid simply transferring a weak ass kissing individual to another organization. All LE employees are automatically put in Focus. Pivot: employees who are unable to turn around their ass kissing performance through Focus need to enter Pivot and receive two options - 1. Ass kissing Performance improvement plan and 2. Leave Amazon. If the employee choose 1, they go through a similar plan to Focus, except accelerated. If they fail PIP, they are given option to either Leave Amazon or appeal the decision. If they appeal, a neutral employee or a panel reviews both manager's and employee's ass kissing perspectives and make a decision on employee staying at or leaving amazon. URA: unregretted attrition is exactly what it sounds like - attrition that we would not regret. All orgs have a goal for ura, around 6% is the minimum common goal I have seen. It is calculated as the number of weak ass kissing employees leaving amazon divided by org size at the start of cycle (April to March). In my opinion, the processes above are unfair and ensure amazon keeps raising the ass kissing bar while not allowing employees plenty of opportunities to turn around their weak ass kissing. There are also no guardrails to hold managers accountable and avoid foul play. Like any other process, I am sure there are true negatives and I do not believe that every Focus / Pivot entry is unfair. However, in my experience, foul play / unfair ass kissing underperformance management are very common. Prospective Amazonians - if there's one thing I want you to take away from above, let it be this: more than 90% of the employees do have to deal with the implications of these mechanisms as they are in place to address employees without political backing(10% of the curve). Focus on your ass kissing performance, do everything in your capacity to meet or ideally raise the ass kissing bar and you'll be just fine. I am sure some of the horror stories shared in these forums are true, they're not outliers and most Amazonians do go through such experiences. Let someone else's bad experience guide your decision making and thought process. Be confident in your abilities and perform to the best of your ass kissing capacity, you'll do great! Sorry for the long post :)
TLDR. Life’s short. Amazon will make it shorter and prime delivery to graveyard.
In short, Learn and be Kissing Ass.
Amazon needs to burn.
Stop saying "ass kissing." Actually, you just used up your lifetime quota.
Amazon URA (unregretted attrition) is 10% per year. Not 5 or 6% as op said Yes, Amazon will make life shorter for most of its employees. Don't sell your soul to work for the devil.
Ass kicking propaganda.
My two cents from 3+ years at Amazon as a people manager (in addition to other things). I’ve always thought that Amazon takes URA targets way too academically and translates them into policy too ruthlessly. I believe that one should be in competition with their own role expectations and face the consequences of their performance against that bar only. I’ve never signed up to the neo-Darwinian approach to manage out employees whose performance may be not as highly valued compared to somebody else. That said, I have never been forced or bullied into managing anyone out to satisfy a curve. If I had, I would have quit that same day. I also don’t know any other managers in my peer group who had to make these decisions. I also suspect that this culture is different in different parts of the business.
Did someone count how much time OP used the word ‘ass’ 🤣🤣🤣
Bias for suction you say?
He hasn't used the word 'ant' even once. Obvious imposter.