Why Abrasiveness Got Him Fired

In this lesson we look at how Ethan was let go twice during the dot-com era. We also examine what he learned from admitting that the common thread in both exits was his own behavior.

- He was combative from his first performance review on, and he fought with a product peer and a sales VP who were each saying something true that he didn’t want to hear.
- Both exits were really about removing conflict, including a “layoff” where he was the only person laid off.
- After the second time, he asked himself who the common element was, and the answer was him.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

The Startup Years

In this lesson we discuss how Ethan Evans’ career began and why he spent his early years at startups rather than established companies. We also look at how those small, fast-moving environments shaped the way he later approached leadership.

- His path ran from wanting to work at Apple through a series of high-speed networking, search and streaming startups.
- He chose startups mostly because friends were there and stock options looked like a gold mine, not because of a deliberate career strategy.
- Most of these companies flamed out around the dot-com bust, which set the stage for his early setbacks.

Original podcast link: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0>

Can a Manager Fire Anyone?

In this lesson we discuss why performance improvement plans rarely succeed. We also look at what employees should do if they find themselves on one.

- Once a manager writes a PIP, they have mentally decided you’re leaving, and that bias becomes self-fulfilling.
- Ethan’s coaching clients, and others he knew of, who were put on a PIP were nearly all fired anyway.
- His advice is to use the PIP period to look for your next job.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

Taking Risks and the Magic Loop

In this lesson we discuss the role of risk and of a partnership with your manager in reaching VP. We also look at why managers want their high performers to succeed.

- Recoverable risks speed up a career, and Ethan’s one regret is that he didn’t take more of them.
- Getting to VP took years of lining up stakeholders and a stable, supportive boss, and he was lucky with the timing.
- The “magic loop” is an agreement with your manager: you do everything they need, and they make sure you’re rewarded for it.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

The Politely Pushy Get Promoted

In this lesson we look at why asking for a promotion works, and the honest reality behind how managers decide. We also cover how to make sure you receive credit when many people worked on the same project.

- When two people are equally qualified, a manager facing limited promotion slots will often reward the one who is pushing and threatening to leave.
- Ethan says almost every manager does this, though few will admit it.
- To get credit in a team effort, you only need a clear, true narrative that the outcome wouldn’t have happened without you.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

Advice to Your Younger Self

In this lesson we wrap up with the two pieces of advice Ethan would give himself at the start of his career. We also look at how one of them is something he did and the other is something he wishes he had done sooner.

- Prefer high-growth companies, because his career was an escalator that rose even when he wasn’t climbing.
- Jobs are still with other humans, so build relationships and a reputation early.
- You don’t have to be an extrovert to do this, since tools like LinkedIn let you build connections from behind your keyboard.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

A Promotion Deal Gone Wrong

In this lesson we cover a time Ethan couldn’t keep a promotion promise to a star engineer. We also look at what it teaches about knowing how the promotion process works before you make a deal.

- The engineer shipped a messy launch in exchange for a promised promotion, but Ethan didn’t know Amazon’s twice-a-year cycle and the date passed.
- You can protect yourself by asking your manager what the deadlines are and what they will do by when.
- The engineer lost a year but went on to a successful career, a reminder that careers are long and setbacks can be recovered.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

Becoming a Director

In this lesson we discuss what Ethan’s promotion to director looked like and the two things that made it happen. We also look at the exact wording he used to apply pressure without making a threat.

- A promotion usually comes either as a “lifetime achievement award” or from an outsized event, and his came from a high-risk project that his leaders had doubts about, summed up by the line “without Ethan, we wouldn’t have had TiVo.”
- He applied pressure politely by saying his career was very important to him and that he needed to know whether it was as important to Amazon.
- His philosophy is that you can find a polite, civil way to raise any topic.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

Why Amazon

In this lesson we discuss how Ethan ended up at Amazon and why he took the risk of moving across the country. We also look at how his earlier work shaped the way Amazon saw him as a candidate.

- He first studied Amazon as a competitor of Barnes & Noble, which showed him how far ahead it was.
- That background helped when Amazon’s recruiter reached out, because he could explain what he had seen.
- His startup was struggling, while Amazon was public and looked stable at 10,000 people.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

Stack Ranking and Unregretted Attrition

In this lesson we examine how Amazon pushes managers to remove low performers each year. We also look at why a system that sounds harsh exists in the first place.

- Each year there is a target for “unregretted attrition,” typically a few percent, which in practice means firing the bottom performers.
- When Amazon dropped the target as an experiment, managers stopped having hard conversations, so it came back the next year.
- The system forces action but can also put people on the list just to meet a quota.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

Hitting Goals vs. Delivering the Vision

In this lesson we discuss how a leader can receive good reviews while the business they run fails to reach its vision. We also look at the tension between goals that protect your pay and goals that actually matter.

- Prime Gaming and the Amazon App Store hit their interim goals but never came close to the bigger vision.
- Big companies often confuse hitting goals with doing something valuable, which leaves “zombie products” that nobody wants to shut down.
- For your own review you want goals you know you can hit, but for the company you want goals you don’t yet know how to reach, and that tension is real.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

Working With Bezos vs. Jassy

In this lesson we compare the leadership styles of Jeff Bezos and Andy Jassy, based on Ethan’s roughly 50 meetings with each. We also look at how being a founder changes the way a leader makes decisions.

- As the founder, Bezos could take bets others wouldn’t, such as telling his CFO that his job was to count the pennies and Bezos’s job was to allocate them.
- Jassy is a more classic business leader who partners with his CFO, because he answers to a board and to Bezos.
- Ethan found Bezos more inspiring and Jassy more probing and likely to leave him “on the hook,” and he stresses that this is his personal experience.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

What Young Founders Get Wrong

In this lesson we look at the gaps Ethan saw in a fast-growing startup after its acquisition. We also discuss how he handled the pressure of sitting between the founder’s team and Amazon’s leadership.

- Twitch leadership didn’t see profitability as a goal because they had always been able to raise venture money, while Amazon leadership wanted profit soon.
- Ethan was caught between those two views.
- Founders often have to replace or level early friends and employees who can’t scale with the company.

Original podcast link:[ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0)

Strategic Annoyance and the Turning Point

In this lesson we discuss why you need to be pushy without being abrasive, and how Ethan changed his behavior. We also cover the moment in a job interview that made him rethink his approach and commit to learning soft skills.

- Being “strategically annoying” means having an opinion and fighting for it without shouting, because people who feel steamrolled stop talking to you and start talking about you.
- He didn’t build alliances, so when a rival went to his colleagues, they agreed he was the problem.
- The turning point came when an interviewer said that if he were that valuable, his old companies would have kept him, which pushed him to study the psychology of work and to ask questions instead of making statements.

Original podcast link: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40-ENZmqcz0>

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