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PieOMy

Member
Nov 15, 2018
616
Boston
I honestly bet that corporate Amazon is 100x better than fulfillment center Amazon.

I saw nothing but red flags while interviewing for a corporate job there. The pay was low for the job and 75% of the developers that I would be working with were contractors. You can find a better job anywhere else.
 

Deleted member 15440

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
4,191
from what i've heard even their non-warehouse jobs are pretty bad in terms of working conditions. probably not "peeing into bottles" bad but worse compared to the rest of the market.

people tend to want to get an amazon job and then use that as a resume boost to get something that doesn't suck.
 

Kill3r7

Member
Oct 25, 2017
24,398
I am getting ready to move to a bigger city. Currently hate the corporate side of my job but I cant decide if working for Amazon would be worse. I will probably just transfer to a position with my current company.

Corporate goals and expectations are just so fucked. It amazes me that somehow no one in management for my department can ever do anything to help make my job less stressful. It comes from corporate and everyone just rolls over and people at the bottom get hit with it. Over and over again.

That's because mid management has virtually no power to speak up. Thus they nod along and do their best to manage expectations from above.
 
Apr 24, 2018
3,605
I recently had a conversation with an Amazon recruiter recently after trying for months to get a job there. She told me I'd have better success there if I worked at a larger company. The company that I work at is just outside the Fortune 150 right now (corporate finance, fwiw)...I can't believe they'd use that as a strong consideration.
 

Inugami

Member
Oct 25, 2017
14,995
I started work at a warehouse recently (one that does mostly food items). It also starts at $15, but I also get full benefits, a 401k with profit sharing (last year my wife, who also works for them got $2000 bonus into it), and instead of being penalized for not reaching a metric, we're instead rewarded for surpassing with incentive pay that caps out at $25 an hour with optional overtime, paid breaks, 45 minute lunch periods, etc etc. And yes, we can stop and use the bathroom whenever we want.

And you know what? The company is not only doing okay, it's been breaking sales records and is in an almost constant state of hiring. It is 100% possible to have a very large operation with multiple warehouses where all of the workers are treated well and still turn a huge profit for the company.

But yeah... Bezos wants to drain ever more profit and maintain his status as the largest billionaire in the world, so that's never going to change.
 

Sei

Member
Oct 28, 2017
5,707
LA
A long while back I interviewed for one of the software positions, embedded systems. But their requirements for a junior position were insanely ridiculous.
 

The Albatross

Member
Oct 25, 2017
38,958
Feel like few are reading the 2nd paragraph of the OP. These aren't warehouse positions, seasonal, or delivery/labor jobs, they're permanent positions in the new offices they're opening. These sound like positions in engineering, development, marketing, sales, program management, etc.

"The posts, which Amazon said it hoped to fill by early next year, are permanent jobs and do not include hourly, seasonal positions like warehouse workers. More than half the jobs are tech-oriented, the company said."

The comments about horrible working conditions, hellscape, physical labor, shitty to their employees, etc., doesn't really apply to these jobs... Engineering/development roles at Amazon are challenging, it's known as a difficult company to work for compared to most top-tier tech companies, but they're generally high paying with decent work/life balance comparatively. They're generally pretty well reviewed positions on GlassDoor. I interviewed for a position in AWS ~3 years ago, didn't get it, not sure if I would have accepted it if I did, but the pay was comparatively good to competitors and the team seemed good.

I've had 2 colleagues go to work for Amazon as senior engineers or experienced engineers, and they're both still with the company. The biggest criticism for working in engineering positions at Amazon is that the junior developer positions are challenging with a high, technical workload. But placement leaving Amazon is really high, they know that having Amazon on your work history is a home run for choosing your next job.

Is there any Jr. software engineering position there

Yeah, probably 5,000-10,000 open recs from the sounds of it.
 

effingvic

Member
Oct 25, 2017
14,159
I honestly bet that corporate Amazon is 100x better than fulfillment center Amazon.

Compared to their warehouse jobs, for sure, but they're one of the most frugal and brutal workplaces in tech. I know a few people that work at Amazon and they're miserable. Sadly, a few years at Amazon opens doors everywhere so a lot of people put up with the bullshit to do better things later on.

This is an old article but it talks about Amazon's work culture: https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/...stling-big-ideas-in-a-bruising-workplace.html

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." The internal phone directory instructs colleagues on how to send secret feedback to one another's bosses. Employees say it is frequently used to sabotage others. (The tool offers sample texts, including this: "I felt concerned about his inflexibility and openly complaining about minor tasks.")

"This is a company that strives to do really big, innovative, groundbreaking things, and those things aren't easy," said Susan Harker, Amazon's top recruiter. "When you're shooting for the moon, the nature of the work is really challenging. For some people it doesn't work."
Bo Olson was one of them. He lasted less than two years in a book marketing role and said that his enduring image was watching people weep in the office, a sight other workers described as well. "You walk out of a conference room and you'll see a grown man covering his face," he said. "Nearly every person I worked with, I saw cry at their desk."
 

Fafalada

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,065
Engineering/development roles at Amazon are challenging, it's known as a difficult company to work for compared to most top-tier tech companies, but they're generally high paying with decent work/life balance comparatively.
In context of this forum it's worth mentioning that tech positions pay better than 99% of the game-industry (in most cases 'much' better, including 'AAA' publishers), and even with the bad teams you're probably not looking at work/life balance that is significantly different/worse from your average game-dev.
 

collige

Member
Oct 31, 2017
12,772
In context of this forum it's worth mentioning that tech positions pay better than 99% of the game-industry (in most cases 'much' better, including 'AAA' publishers), and even with the bad teams you're probably not looking at work/life balance that is significantly different/worse from your average game-dev.
That's not saying much.
 

Astronut325

Member
Oct 27, 2017
5,948
Los Angeles, CA
Family friend works for Amazon as a software engineer. Works 60-70 hour weeks every week. He's been out of college for a bit now and is looking to bail out of Amazon soon.

I've thought about applying to Amazon for some time now, but their work conditions suck. There is no work-life balance.
 

Deleted member 16365

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
4,127
How many of these are warehouse jobs that people don't want though? Sure they might have a few SWE or PM jobs, and maybe some in marketing, but I'd be willing to bet majority of these are to replace people who were fed up with having to forgo bathroom breaks in order to not get fired.
 

Dark Knight

One Winged Slayer
Member
Oct 25, 2017
19,263
Do you have to lick boots just because your life isn't hell?
I'm not quite sure I understand the question.
I'm not making any statements about all warehouse jobs, Amazon's labor issues, or refuting that someone can have a really bad experience working for the company. Just offering a counter view about my own anecdotal experience is all. No need to leap down my throat.
 

The Albatross

Member
Oct 25, 2017
38,958
In context of this forum it's worth mentioning that tech positions pay better than 99% of the game-industry (in most cases 'much' better, including 'AAA' publishers), and even with the bad teams you're probably not looking at work/life balance that is significantly different/worse from your average game-dev.

Oh god, yeah spot on.

The worst engineering job at Amazon is likely higher paying, more rewarding, and a better work/life balance, than the best job in game development.

I'm not quite sure I understand the question.
I'm not making any statements about all warehouse jobs, Amazon's labor issues, or refuting that someone can have a really bad experience working for the company. Just offering a counter view about my own anecdotal experience is all. No need to leap down my throat.

Don't bother. Clearly everyone else knows your job better than you do.
 

Kill3r7

Member
Oct 25, 2017
24,398
How many of these are warehouse jobs that people don't want though? Sure they might have a few SWE or PM jobs, and maybe some in marketing, but I'd be willing to bet majority of these are to replace people who were fed up with having to forgo bathroom breaks in order to not get fired.

These are not warehouse jobs. See the article.
 

SugarNoodles

Member
Nov 3, 2017
8,625
Portland, OR
I'm not quite sure I understand the question.
I'm not making any statements about all warehouse jobs, Amazon's labor issues, or refuting that someone can have a really bad experience working for the company. Just offering a counter view about my own anecdotal experience is all. No need to leap down my throat.
Not leaping down your throat. Just telling you what you're doing and asking you to not do that.
 
Oct 27, 2017
42,700
In context of this forum it's worth mentioning that tech positions pay better than 99% of the game-industry (in most cases 'much' better, including 'AAA' publishers), and even with the bad teams you're probably not looking at work/life balance that is significantly different/worse from your average game-dev.
Most tech jobs pay comparable, if not more than video games, and have a better work/life balance so that isn't saying much. The game industry is highly competitive and "popular" so they take advantage of that with workers while these other jobs, while similar, largely need more employees and are in competition with each other, which makes them care more about benefits/compensation
 

dark494

Avenger
Oct 29, 2017
4,548
Seattle
It would probably help if they weren't so shitty to their employees.
This is really the core issue with amazon. From every angle. Warehouse/fulfillment, devs, execs, HR, and everything in between. I hear never-ending tales from many, many co-workers over the last 7-8 years who were former amazon employees and it's nothing but the worst. The kind of place who's culture is designed to work you to death but compensate you well for it. Every last one of them left because of that mentality, the compensation is never worth the stress, the hours, the toxic environment, and the pressure. Work-life balance is essential.
 

Spinluck

â–˛ Legend â–˛
Avenger
Oct 26, 2017
28,429
Chicago
What does this mean?

Going to be entirely honest. I assumed the worst before reading the OP. Only to read it when I got to my work desk and applied for one of the career events here. Lol.

I thought these were all garbage warehouse/delivery jobs. Even then, they aren't exactly the best employer and they can improve the conditions and treatment of their warehouse workers.
 

Ether_Snake

Banned
Oct 29, 2017
11,306
There is an historic shortage of labor. So those of you saying people don't take those 30k jobs because of working conditions are saying said workers are jobless. Job numbers don't reflect that at all.

It's pretty simple: there is a lack of labor. Not a lot of businesses can say they have 30k job openings, but it's the same issue businesses are facing across the US, same problem in Canada: labor shortage.
 

Quzar

Banned
Oct 31, 2017
1,166
Fuck it, been looking for a software engineering job for like 3 months. I'll apply to anything at this point.
 

KeinPlanB

Alt account
Banned
Aug 6, 2019
105
If Trump knew low unemployment might actually be good for workers and a problem for corporations he probably wouldn't be that happy about it
 

Fafalada

Member
Oct 27, 2017
3,065
That's not saying much.
It's kind of notable since some of those 30k jobs are also in games.

The worst engineering job at Amazon is likely higher paying, more rewarding, and a better work/life balance, than the best job in game development.
I wouldn't go so far - the tech industry at large (not just Amazon) is drunk on its own koolaid, but the jobs are often not all that rewarding. Of course it's easier to justify that with the paycheck.

while these other jobs, while similar, largely need more employees and are in competition with each other, which makes them care more about benefits/compensation
I'm not sure I entirely buy that. There are locations of game-industry where companies compete for the same work-force and there's been no significant inflation of compensation that I'm aware of in those spots. And also games are actively bleeding their best talent to these 'other' tech companies as result of compensation structure - the 1% from my previous post that do pay competitively are largely not what you'd call traditional gamedev-studios(though they're still some of the better known industry names).
 

Akita One

Member
Oct 30, 2017
4,626
No, this is the reality of lots of big companies in the US. Pretty much every major company, especially in tech, has tons of open positions
Thanks for being the first voice of reason. Literally every company with jobs that pay more than $15 have alot of openings. It's an employee's market right now. For the last year I've been getting calls left and right even though I haven't applied for anything in awhile.
 
Dec 31, 2017
7,085
Going to be entirely honest. I assumed the worst before reading the OP. Only to read it when I got to my work desk and applied for one of the career events here. Lol.

I thought these were all garbage warehouse/delivery jobs. Even then, they aren't exactly the best employer and they can improve the conditions and treatment of their warehouse workers.

Lol I respect the honesty.
 

BigBlue

Alt-Account
Banned
Jun 6, 2019
203
Currently in the process of recruitment for a software engineering role. Hoping for the best
 

Ether_Snake

Banned
Oct 29, 2017
11,306
The wrong kind of jobs have no labor shortage, a lot of them being low paying jobs with poor working conditions or lack of benefits. But they're the ones most easily filled. That leaves a lot of high paying jobs open but not enough people coming out of schools to get them.
 

Septimus Prime

EA
Verified
Oct 25, 2017
8,500
I hear their culture is super cutthroat. Like Netflix, where your team is more like a sports team and let like a family.