10 ms·

Is it really so dysfunctional there that if this happens to you (manager puts you on PIP upon being notified you're doing an internal transfer) there's no one t

by yrral 5y ago

Is it really so dysfunctional there that if this happens to you (manager puts you on PIP upon being notified you're doing an internal transfer) there's no one to talk to to make this right? Maybe his manager is a piece of shit, but I can't believe there's no one to report to above him that can see this for what it is and make it right?

freewilly1040 5y ago
People don’t get friendlier up the food chain. It’s highly likely the line manager is reacting to pressure coming from above themselves.
- mistyislands 5y ago
  Agree. It is unlikely the manager did this out of pettiness. He probably got pressured by his L7/L8 to fire someone for his org to meet the URA goal. He made the obvious choice and picked the guy applying for internal transfer. Why lose two people when you could just lose one?
goldenkey 5y ago
HR at Amazon is a shit show. I had $100 of pizza stolen from the fridge at Amazon and I mentioned it casually to HR, as something notable but not too important. And HR then decided to tell my manager without my knowledge. The manager then berated me over communicating about a "trivial matter." So yeah, wouldn't put much stock in HR at Amazon.
- rendall 5y ago
  Maybe manager stole the pizza.
  - goldenkey 5y ago
    Well, I left because of him. He stole my dignity.
    - rendall 5y ago
      Dignity and pizza.
- akomtu 5y ago
  You should've played the game and claimed you've never said what HR says you've said and in fact (here goes the distraction part of the lie) you heard another guy was talking about pizza, so HR must've overheard that conversation and misremembered the details.
  - winrid 5y ago
    The problem is the manager would probably start with "did you have a pizza stolen?" without mentioning HR
    - akomtu 5y ago
      From this question alone you could figure who's trying to backstab you.
    - psd1 5y ago
      The stolen item needs to slightly vary in each telling. Catch a mole 101.
      - greedo 5y ago
        They'll have to call it the "Pizza Trap" instead of the Canary Trap...
- dec0dedab0de 5y ago
  I know it's not the point, but how/why did you have $100 worth of pizza in the refrigerator? Edit: I'm trying to imagine scenarios where that could happen, I have two so far. You ordered pizza for a meeting that got canceled, and the office refrigerator was huge. Or you ordered from a fancy pizza place that had waygu or something as a topping. I'm sorry, I don't know why this is bothering me so much.
  - cerved 5y ago
    it's clearly a lie! The value of pizza is inversely correlated to the time it's been out of the oven. Once it's in the refrigerator it's worth max 1%
    - rendall 5y ago
      Maybe original cost had been $10,000?
    - Balarny 5y ago
      I mean ... one of my guilty pleasures is leftover pizza straight out of the fridge. Something about that chilled, congealed fat and sugar ... mmmmmmmmm So to me it makes perfect sense that it's $100
    - goldenkey 5y ago
      I for one like leftover pizza if it hasn't hardened into a rock. In this case, the pizza had only been in there for less than a day.
  - oceliker 5y ago
    Maybe it was paid for with bitcoin, like the infamous case: https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/cryptocurrency/bitcoin-pizza-day-2021-some-interesting-facts-about-this-special-cryptocurrency-day-6924731.html https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/cryptocurrency/bi...
  - orlp 5y ago
    Or it was $100 worth of pizza spread over a longer period.
- Seb-C 5y ago
  If you had got an NFT for your pizza, this wouldn't have happened since this would prevent them from... Oh wait...
- danjac 5y ago
  $100 of pizza? Isn't that a whole AWS service's worth?
  - goldenkey 5y ago
    I was making good money. And this chef makes pizza to die for: https://www.seriouspieseattle.com/serious-take-out-ballard/ https://www.seriouspieseattle.com/serious-take-out-ballard/
    - danjac 5y ago
      https://docs.aws.amazon.com/whitepapers/latest/introduction-devops-aws/two-pizza-teams.html https://docs.aws.amazon.com/whitepapers/latest/introduction-...
zeckalpha 5y ago
Yes, there was an exemption process for this while I was there. (Though it wasn’t called PIP)
ActorNightly 5y ago
The issue with Amazon is that due to its size, working on a team is essentially like working for a separate company. If you are moving across big orgs, you are just a blip in the system should something like this come up. And just like a group of startups, some are going to be run worse than others. Additionally, because of the internal transfer policy and teams frequently switching out members, a lot of work is designed to be picked up by a new person, especially at the SD1/SD2 levels, so people are generally replaceable. Couple that with the fact that the interview process only tests for academic knowledge, without really proving that you can set up infra and services in production. And even more on top on top of that, Amazon gets a never ending candidate pool. So you get a combination of both poor performance that actually need to get PIPed out mixed in with poor teams that are ran like crap because managers themselves are not really technical and end up not delivering and then having to PIP people out. That being said, because of this sort of structure, if you know how to make moves and "read the room" so to speak, Amazon is the best company for finding that sweet spot of maximizing revenue/actual hour worked. If you are a talented software engineer, not just a developer and generally know how to navigate around managers, you can hit senior engineer or manager levels quite easily, and then cruise control your way at $300k a year, and with an added benefit of lots of remote positions right now (since wfh is a big selling point in order to not get rejected by good candidates). From talking to people at Google/Facebook, those kind of moves are a lot harder to do.
- selestify 5y ago
  > If you are a talented software engineer, not just a developer and generally know how to navigate around managers, you can hit senior engineer or manager levels quite easily, How do you “navigate” your way around an 11:30 PM email that contains a 5:30 AM deadline, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread?
  - Snoozus 5y ago
    ignore it
  - robertcope 5y ago
    "I was asleep. The expectation that I would see it, much less respond to it, is crazy."
franczesko 5y ago
> Maybe his manager is a piece of shit, but I can't believe there's no one to report to above him that can see this for what it is and make it right? PIP is a tool in manager's hands and above L6 no one gives a squat. They even encourage using it.
thinkharderdev 5y ago
One piece of advice I always offer to younger software engineers about corporate politics is to ALWAYS try your best to make sure you have a relationship with your manager's manager. Cutting out links in the corporate telephone game is invaluable sometimes.

by yrral 5y ago

freewilly1040 5y ago

People don’t get friendlier up the food chain. It’s highly likely the line manager is reacting to pressure coming from above themselves.

mistyislands 5y ago
Agree. It is unlikely the manager did this out of pettiness. He probably got pressured by his L7/L8 to fire someone for his org to meet the URA goal. He made the obvious choice and picked the guy applying for internal transfer. Why lose two people when you could just lose one?

goldenkey 5y ago

HR at Amazon is a shit show. I had $100 of pizza stolen from the fridge at Amazon and I mentioned it casually to HR, as something notable but not too important. And HR then decided to tell my manager without my knowledge. The manager then berated me over communicating about a "trivial matter." So yeah, wouldn't put much stock in HR at Amazon.

rendall 5y ago
Maybe manager stole the pizza.
- goldenkey 5y ago
  Well, I left because of him. He stole my dignity.
  - rendall 5y ago
    Dignity and pizza.
akomtu 5y ago
You should've played the game and claimed you've never said what HR says you've said and in fact (here goes the distraction part of the lie) you heard another guy was talking about pizza, so HR must've overheard that conversation and misremembered the details.
- winrid 5y ago
  The problem is the manager would probably start with "did you have a pizza stolen?" without mentioning HR
  - akomtu 5y ago
    From this question alone you could figure who's trying to backstab you.
  - psd1 5y ago
    The stolen item needs to slightly vary in each telling. Catch a mole 101.
    - greedo 5y ago
      They'll have to call it the "Pizza Trap" instead of the Canary Trap...
dec0dedab0de 5y ago
I know it's not the point, but how/why did you have $100 worth of pizza in the refrigerator? Edit: I'm trying to imagine scenarios where that could happen, I have two so far. You ordered pizza for a meeting that got canceled, and the office refrigerator was huge. Or you ordered from a fancy pizza place that had waygu or something as a topping. I'm sorry, I don't know why this is bothering me so much.
- cerved 5y ago
  it's clearly a lie! The value of pizza is inversely correlated to the time it's been out of the oven. Once it's in the refrigerator it's worth max 1%
  - rendall 5y ago
    Maybe original cost had been $10,000?
  - Balarny 5y ago
    I mean ... one of my guilty pleasures is leftover pizza straight out of the fridge. Something about that chilled, congealed fat and sugar ... mmmmmmmmm So to me it makes perfect sense that it's $100
  - goldenkey 5y ago
    I for one like leftover pizza if it hasn't hardened into a rock. In this case, the pizza had only been in there for less than a day.
- oceliker 5y ago
  Maybe it was paid for with bitcoin, like the infamous case: https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/cryptocurrency/bitcoin-pizza-day-2021-some-interesting-facts-about-this-special-cryptocurrency-day-6924731.html https://www.moneycontrol.com/news/business/cryptocurrency/bi...
- orlp 5y ago
  Or it was $100 worth of pizza spread over a longer period.
Seb-C 5y ago
If you had got an NFT for your pizza, this wouldn't have happened since this would prevent them from... Oh wait...
danjac 5y ago
$100 of pizza? Isn't that a whole AWS service's worth?
- goldenkey 5y ago
  I was making good money. And this chef makes pizza to die for: https://www.seriouspieseattle.com/serious-take-out-ballard/ https://www.seriouspieseattle.com/serious-take-out-ballard/
  - danjac 5y ago
    https://docs.aws.amazon.com/whitepapers/latest/introduction-devops-aws/two-pizza-teams.html https://docs.aws.amazon.com/whitepapers/latest/introduction-...

zeckalpha 5y ago

Yes, there was an exemption process for this while I was there. (Though it wasn’t called PIP)

ActorNightly 5y ago

The issue with Amazon is that due to its size, working on a team is essentially like working for a separate company. If you are moving across big orgs, you are just a blip in the system should something like this come up. And just like a group of startups, some are going to be run worse than others. Additionally, because of the internal transfer policy and teams frequently switching out members, a lot of work is designed to be picked up by a new person, especially at the SD1/SD2 levels, so people are generally replaceable. Couple that with the fact that the interview process only tests for academic knowledge, without really proving that you can set up infra and services in production. And even more on top on top of that, Amazon gets a never ending candidate pool. So you get a combination of both poor performance that actually need to get PIPed out mixed in with poor teams that are ran like crap because managers themselves are not really technical and end up not delivering and then having to PIP people out. That being said, because of this sort of structure, if you know how to make moves and "read the room" so to speak, Amazon is the best company for finding that sweet spot of maximizing revenue/actual hour worked. If you are a talented software engineer, not just a developer and generally know how to navigate around managers, you can hit senior engineer or manager levels quite easily, and then cruise control your way at $300k a year, and with an added benefit of lots of remote positions right now (since wfh is a big selling point in order to not get rejected by good candidates). From talking to people at Google/Facebook, those kind of moves are a lot harder to do.

selestify 5y ago
> If you are a talented software engineer, not just a developer and generally know how to navigate around managers, you can hit senior engineer or manager levels quite easily, How do you “navigate” your way around an 11:30 PM email that contains a 5:30 AM deadline, as mentioned elsewhere in this thread?
- Snoozus 5y ago
  ignore it
- robertcope 5y ago
  "I was asleep. The expectation that I would see it, much less respond to it, is crazy."

franczesko 5y ago

> Maybe his manager is a piece of shit, but I can't believe there's no one to report to above him that can see this for what it is and make it right? PIP is a tool in manager's hands and above L6 no one gives a squat. They even encourage using it.

thinkharderdev 5y ago

One piece of advice I always offer to younger software engineers about corporate politics is to ALWAYS try your best to make sure you have a relationship with your manager's manager. Cutting out links in the corporate telephone game is invaluable sometimes.