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Your post is a prime example of what is wrong with Amazon - I'm not sure if you were aware of the irony when you wrote it. If the author is capable of developi

Your post is a prime example of what is wrong with Amazon - I'm not sure if you were aware of the irony when you wrote it. If the author is capable of developing systems that save the company hundreds of millions of dollars per year, why the fuck does it matter if they are a "great person to work with"?

dragontamer 11y ago
> If the author is capable of developing systems that save the company hundreds of millions of dollars per year, why the fuck does it matter if they are a "great person to work with"? If the author is a narcissist, they would be mistaken about saving the company hundreds of millions of dollars per year. Remember, this is from the author's point of view. Allegedly, he was working with PH.Ds and others who disagreed with his metrics. A man who within his own rant claimed to be smarter than everyone else in his team. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect Dunning Kruger effect is real. A man who says nothing good about his own team (that he admits has PH.Ds that were disagreeing with him) is hard to believe. The author is probably honest about _believing_ that he was saving millions of dollars per year. But perhaps he was an idiot and his metrics were wrong. And based on my experience, when a rant begins with: > I love to solve real world problems, and in many ways am the perfect type of person for Amazon's culture You can almost certainly believe the guy is on the "Illusory superiority" side of the Dunning Kruger effect.
- mildbow 11y ago
  Sure. But, maybe you can try to recall all the other people saying pretty much the same thing about working for amazon? Does that help you judge this post a little more favourably/give it more credence?
  - dragontamer 11y ago
    Nope. Anyone who has worked in this industry knows that middle management can make or break a team. All that the news has told me is that some middle management at Amazon sucks. Which is true for all companies. Some middle managers are absolutely awful at their job. The engineers then blame the company in its entirety, not realizing that it was their direct supervisors who were messing up. I'm sure Amazon has their fair share of awful managers. But all companies do. Honestly, a professional would write up specifics beyond "My analysis says that I saved millions of dollars but no one else on my team believed my numbers". Which is the crux of his entire argument unfortunately. I don't see anything here about awful bosses micromanaging him. I don't see him mentioning the turnover of his team (My sister had an awful boss. Her entire team left within 6 months. She was the last one to get out about a year later. The entire team took a paycut to leave for another company) I know what awful bosses sound like. Failing to give a promotion to one dude who self-thought he was doing good is not necessarily indicative of a mistake. Tell me the numbers. How many team members (or what percent) has left the team in the past 6 months? How have _other smart_ team members been ignored? When a team is awful, it effects more than just you personally. The people who complain with true vigor are the ones who see it in their coworkers. If its 100% personal anecdote of a self taught self-described polymath... sorry, I'm chocking it up to the Dunning-Kruger effect.
- bduerst 11y ago
  There is absolutely no evidence here that they have dunning krugers. In fact, their continued employment at a company that routinely cuts the lower performers is probably evidence against them having dunning krugers.
  - dragontamer 11y ago
    The guy's entire 2794 word anonymous rant is 100% about himself. If he wasn't a narcissist, he'd have managed to fit at least a few words about how a coworker was mistreated.
    - bduerst 11y ago
      The 2794 word post is 100% about his experience at Amazon. Not writing stories about your co-workers qualifies you for NPD now? Why are you splitting hairs?
      - dragontamer 11y ago
        He's talking about his management and how it affected himself. The fact that he has failed to account for how his management effects his team is very telling about the guy's personality. I'm not asking for much, just a paragraph or two that proves that this "throwaway" account isn't 100% narcissistic. But again, nearly 3000 words and nothing about teammates or coworkers in there. That's pretty telling honestly.
  - ubercore 11y ago
    It's not a disorder, like something that someone "has". It's a logical fallacy that affects most (all?) human brains to varying degrees.
    - dragontamer 11y ago
      Good read. This is an important note. _Everyone_ has the Dunning Kruger effect. It is a glitch that occurs in virtually all human brains, including myself and yourself. That's why its very important to keep coworkers in mind. You can be a lot more objective about other people than you can be about yourself. Its like the eternal joke goes. If you ask a team "who is the best programmer", everyone will probably say "me" or "myself". However, if you want to _really_ know the best programmer, ask the team who the 2nd best programmer is.
therobot24 11y ago
>> why the fuck does it matter if they are a "great person to work with" Cause no one wants to work with an asshole, no matter how smart they are. There's plenty of other engineers out there that can build systems and save money, maybe not to the specific degree that OP claims to be able to, but unlike OP they'll work with their team.
- tuyguntn 11y ago
  Cause no one wants to work with an asshole, no matter how smart they are. I guess thats why HR should work more to find people with different mindset, ability and should create working environment for them, where is the equality then? Not everyone succeeds in social terms, not everyone is good at amusing their peers, there are some people who do better in academic/virtual stuff, but not so good in other terms, so what? should they die? should they always live in dirt? My small brain suggests me that's the problem of HR
  - therobot24 11y ago
    >> I guess thats why HR should work more to find people with different mindset, ability and should create working environment for them What? Who suggested that. >> Not everyone succeeds in social terms, not everyone is good at amusing their peers, there are some people who do better in academic/virtual stuff, but not so good in other terms. No one claimed that everyone/anyone needs to better in social situations. However, there's a clear and obvious difference between lack of social skills and being an asshole. >> so what? should they die? should they always live in dirt? Or they could stop being an asshole? They could try to resist their urges to consistently alienate and discredit the work of their team mates. Maybe give that a shot.
    - tuyguntn 11y ago
      What? Who suggested that. Everyone has their own opinion on that topic, but if we rely on Wikipedia [1] Human resource management (HRM, or simply HR) is a function in organizations designed to -->maximize employee performance<-- another topic tells Organizations will engage in a broad range of human resource management practices to capitalize on those assets.[2] If your HR cannot capitalize assets, if your HR cannot maximize performance, if your HR hired asshole, who is the responsible? HR [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resource_management https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resource_management [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resources https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resources

dragontamer 11y ago

> If the author is capable of developing systems that save the company hundreds of millions of dollars per year, why the fuck does it matter if they are a "great person to work with"? If the author is a narcissist, they would be mistaken about saving the company hundreds of millions of dollars per year. Remember, this is from the author's point of view. Allegedly, he was working with PH.Ds and others who disagreed with his metrics. A man who within his own rant claimed to be smarter than everyone else in his team. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect Dunning Kruger effect is real. A man who says nothing good about his own team (that he admits has PH.Ds that were disagreeing with him) is hard to believe. The author is probably honest about _believing_ that he was saving millions of dollars per year. But perhaps he was an idiot and his metrics were wrong. And based on my experience, when a rant begins with: > I love to solve real world problems, and in many ways am the perfect type of person for Amazon's culture You can almost certainly believe the guy is on the "Illusory superiority" side of the Dunning Kruger effect.

mildbow 11y ago
Sure. But, maybe you can try to recall all the other people saying pretty much the same thing about working for amazon? Does that help you judge this post a little more favourably/give it more credence?
- dragontamer 11y ago
  Nope. Anyone who has worked in this industry knows that middle management can make or break a team. All that the news has told me is that some middle management at Amazon sucks. Which is true for all companies. Some middle managers are absolutely awful at their job. The engineers then blame the company in its entirety, not realizing that it was their direct supervisors who were messing up. I'm sure Amazon has their fair share of awful managers. But all companies do. Honestly, a professional would write up specifics beyond "My analysis says that I saved millions of dollars but no one else on my team believed my numbers". Which is the crux of his entire argument unfortunately. I don't see anything here about awful bosses micromanaging him. I don't see him mentioning the turnover of his team (My sister had an awful boss. Her entire team left within 6 months. She was the last one to get out about a year later. The entire team took a paycut to leave for another company) I know what awful bosses sound like. Failing to give a promotion to one dude who self-thought he was doing good is not necessarily indicative of a mistake. Tell me the numbers. How many team members (or what percent) has left the team in the past 6 months? How have _other smart_ team members been ignored? When a team is awful, it effects more than just you personally. The people who complain with true vigor are the ones who see it in their coworkers. If its 100% personal anecdote of a self taught self-described polymath... sorry, I'm chocking it up to the Dunning-Kruger effect.
bduerst 11y ago
There is absolutely no evidence here that they have dunning krugers. In fact, their continued employment at a company that routinely cuts the lower performers is probably evidence against them having dunning krugers.
- dragontamer 11y ago
  The guy's entire 2794 word anonymous rant is 100% about himself. If he wasn't a narcissist, he'd have managed to fit at least a few words about how a coworker was mistreated.
  - bduerst 11y ago
    The 2794 word post is 100% about his experience at Amazon. Not writing stories about your co-workers qualifies you for NPD now? Why are you splitting hairs?
    - dragontamer 11y ago
      He's talking about his management and how it affected himself. The fact that he has failed to account for how his management effects his team is very telling about the guy's personality. I'm not asking for much, just a paragraph or two that proves that this "throwaway" account isn't 100% narcissistic. But again, nearly 3000 words and nothing about teammates or coworkers in there. That's pretty telling honestly.
- ubercore 11y ago
  It's not a disorder, like something that someone "has". It's a logical fallacy that affects most (all?) human brains to varying degrees.
  - dragontamer 11y ago
    Good read. This is an important note. _Everyone_ has the Dunning Kruger effect. It is a glitch that occurs in virtually all human brains, including myself and yourself. That's why its very important to keep coworkers in mind. You can be a lot more objective about other people than you can be about yourself. Its like the eternal joke goes. If you ask a team "who is the best programmer", everyone will probably say "me" or "myself". However, if you want to _really_ know the best programmer, ask the team who the 2nd best programmer is.

therobot24 11y ago

>> why the fuck does it matter if they are a "great person to work with" Cause no one wants to work with an asshole, no matter how smart they are. There's plenty of other engineers out there that can build systems and save money, maybe not to the specific degree that OP claims to be able to, but unlike OP they'll work with their team.

tuyguntn 11y ago
Cause no one wants to work with an asshole, no matter how smart they are. I guess thats why HR should work more to find people with different mindset, ability and should create working environment for them, where is the equality then? Not everyone succeeds in social terms, not everyone is good at amusing their peers, there are some people who do better in academic/virtual stuff, but not so good in other terms, so what? should they die? should they always live in dirt? My small brain suggests me that's the problem of HR
- therobot24 11y ago
  >> I guess thats why HR should work more to find people with different mindset, ability and should create working environment for them What? Who suggested that. >> Not everyone succeeds in social terms, not everyone is good at amusing their peers, there are some people who do better in academic/virtual stuff, but not so good in other terms. No one claimed that everyone/anyone needs to better in social situations. However, there's a clear and obvious difference between lack of social skills and being an asshole. >> so what? should they die? should they always live in dirt? Or they could stop being an asshole? They could try to resist their urges to consistently alienate and discredit the work of their team mates. Maybe give that a shot.
  - tuyguntn 11y ago
    What? Who suggested that. Everyone has their own opinion on that topic, but if we rely on Wikipedia [1] Human resource management (HRM, or simply HR) is a function in organizations designed to -->maximize employee performance<-- another topic tells Organizations will engage in a broad range of human resource management practices to capitalize on those assets.[2] If your HR cannot capitalize assets, if your HR cannot maximize performance, if your HR hired asshole, who is the responsible? HR [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resource_management https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resource_management [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resources https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_resources