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A former great company going down the drain

Software Development Engineer
Current Employee
Has worked at Amazon for 4 years
September 26, 2017
Bengaluru, Karnataka
2.0
Doesn't RecommendNeutral Outlook
Pros
  • Dynamic and fast-moving. Lots of new projects keep coming, and one gets full ownership. From design to implementation to maintenance, the entire job belongs to the same team or individual.
  • Easy to change teams or relocate to different cities globally.
  • Good learning opportunity in every domain you work on. Ample opportunity to lead and drive new initiatives.
  • You will be surrounded by a lot of smart people.
Cons

Corruption. People in leadership/management are corrupt. They are dishonest with each other and manipulate data just to prove themselves right. The overall attitude is quite selfish. Management will do things just to increase their personal influence.

A lot of customer obsession but no employee obsession. No perks for employees. Even basic necessities like food and snacks are of poor quality.

You lose competitive market salary if you stay for too long. The increase in salary internally is drastically less compared to what you get if you switch or join as an external candidate.

End up working over 50+ hours per week for a majority of the year when the official number is 40 hours per week.

Promotion process is very opaque. If you are a favorite of some manager higher in the chain, you might get promoted in 1 year when the average time for anyone else might be 3 years. This again is a form of corruption.

The HR team is useless and corrupt as well. HR is supposed to act as an independent watchdog and ensure that no wrongdoings are happening in the organization. Instead, they work in close conjunction with higher management and agree to whatever they say. If you are a junior employee and raise a complaint against management, your voice will be suppressed by HR.

Advice to Management

My advice to management is to stop blaming the lowest-ranking employee in the chain for your own failures. A good leader is one who takes care of everyone under him and helps the weakest person on the team. It's not about just promotions; it's about helping people grow in their field in terms of soft and hard skills. Managers should learn to protect their subordinates. A simple leadership principle of caring for the people you work with will go much further than the other 14 combined. People work really hard, and corruption and selfishness in leadership are deteriorating the work experience of most employees in Amazon India. Jeff Bezos should really do an introspection of the work environment, especially in India. Leadership in Amazon is actually more of an authority to which people have to obey rather than something which people want to follow.

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