> By all accounts, Amazon is a hard place to work. It sounds like it's demanding, difficult and puts employees under a constant microscope that cannot help but

> By all accounts, Amazon is a hard place to work. It sounds like it's demanding, difficult and puts employees under a constant microscope that cannot help but increase stress. Given the track record, it probably surprises none of us to read these stories. It most certainly is and not everyone is cut out for the amount of pressure and stress put on engineers. This is the truth of the matter. Some crumble by walking away to other jobs and other venues, others crumble by sadly things far worse like the events that unfolded yesterday. Personally I look around and realize I work with people capable of working at the other big tech companies, I work with people from all the big brand name schools. I work with a remarkable group of individuals (business and engineers). There is a constant pressure to succeed and out perform your peers. I tell me wife at times that sometimes I want to go back to working at a sub shop for minimum wage like I did in college because all I do now is pad Amazon's bottom line. I help amazon grow their revenue and make stock holders rich. Sure they pay well, sure they give out stock too and so the grass isn't always greener. I remind myself though that I work with the greatest of great in our industry and we all want to excel so it is a constant competition. I also accepted that if I am not cut out for it I will leave. Until that day I need to have the mental stability and fortitude to manage and cope with the stress and pressure. What is most sad though is the few negative cries outweigh the multitude of positive. I work with an amazing team, we have normal hours, our on-call is normal and some weeks I never get paged and we even take time off around the holidays because our team and team's leadership has our shit together.