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I'm amazed both with the number of messages I get from Amazon about job openings and the aggressiveness of them. Add on how many are for ill fitting or basicall

I'm amazed both with the number of messages I get from Amazon about job openings and the aggressiveness of them. Add on how many are for ill fitting or basically Hail Mary type positions (During the height of the pandemic I got one wanting me to move to Ireland to work in an Amazon office there. They even acknowledged the oddness of the situation but they were really desperate for people to fill those roles). Seems like Amazon was blown through most of the labor supply and now can't find workers, not because they don't exist but because they don't want to work for Amazon. Doubt more money is going to fix this though perhaps pushing for more visas will let them get some workers who haven't been burnt by Amazon yet. Amazon simply has a bad culture which must be fixed. Even then, it'll take time to repair their reputation.

joshgachnang 5y ago
I get at least 5x the emails from Amazon as Google/Microsoft/Facebook. And lately I've told every single one until they have fully remote teams, I'm not interested and to stop emailing me. And yet almost every other week, a new one messages me.
tdeck 5y ago
> During the height of the pandemic I got one wanting me to move to Ireland to work in an Amazon office there. There's probably some engineer out there who's always wanted to live in Ireland. That said, I imagine if you're in the "hire to fire" bucket it would suck extra to be in anouther country with no job.
anonporridge 5y ago
Amazon chickens coming home to roost.
aantix 5y ago
Agree. Looking at HN, Blind, Glassdoor, very rarely do I remember seeing an engineer that would openly state that they love working there.
- Kranar 5y ago
  Plenty of software developers would kill to work for Amazon, sure the work conditions and prestige is not as great as the other big companies but Amazon still pays pretty darn well. The big issue is the developers Amazon wants to hire are not the same as the developers who want to work there, so Amazon is basically paying a huge premium to attract people. That said let's not kid ourselves, the majority of people at Amazon are happy to be there, get paid very well, and are reasonably competent.
  - aantix 5y ago
    Clearly with their base pay and RSUs, they still weren't offering enough. A doubling of base pay means that they realize they have been way off the mark.
  - munk-a 5y ago
    I don't know how well that impression is born out by the generally short tenures and increasing growth of base pay that we're observing. Lots of decently large tech firms pay well beyond Amazon's rates and manage to retain people for far longer - this move specifically seems to be highlighting that the compensation Amazon was offering was insufficient for the pain employees were being burdened with. I do also think FAANG built up a reputation for inaccessibility to intermediate devs which gives them an air of prestige but also significantly impairs their hiring ability.
- davidrupp 5y ago
  I'm a senior SDE (L6) @ AMZN (currently IMDb) with seven years tenure -- opinions my own, obvs. I've had some negative experiences with individuals / organizations over that time, but on balance I can honestly say I love working here. It is quite possible to get maneuvered into a bad situation such that you end up having to leave through no real fault of your own, but it's also possible to find a good fit and do exactly what the motto says: "Work hard, have fun, make history".
- yolovoe 5y ago
  I work at Amazon. Less than 2 yoe but is comp is solid, even compared to Goog and Meta, perhaps cause I'm currently top of band. Wlb is amazing. Did 5-6 hour days on last team. Coworkers were chill. Now I work more (6-7 hour days) cause I'm on a systems team, but I get to learn a lot about how EC2 servers are run. My manager cares about my learning and I get basically an hour a week with the tech lead where I can ask them questions. Have been able to meet a couple principal engineers and they've even reviewed some of my work. I have nothing bad to shared about my experience so far. Did I mention I don't have deadlines?
laweijfmvo 5y ago
Amazon recruiting is a disaster. I’m used to receiving a reach out once or twice a year, but late last year I had at least four recruiters reaching out, three simultaneously. I think one even attempted to automate the process because I received two separate emails from him along with follow ups on each in a matter of four hours, and my replies never got through as they were completely ignored as he continued to follow up (on both original emails) several times over the next week.
- dralley 5y ago
  > I think one even attempted to automate the process because I received two separate emails from him along with follow ups on each in a matter of four hours, and my replies never got through as they were completely ignored as he continued to follow up (on both original emails) several times over the next week. This happened to me. I got the exact same recruiting email from the exact same recruiter a week after I had already responded by declining.
- 1024core 5y ago
  Amazon Recruiting is indeed a disaster. I got approached by an Amazon recruiter, and instead of just ignoring him, I decided to see "what's out there". I'm a staff SWE level at a decent company, so not exactly desperate to leave. He proposed a hard time for a phone call later that week. I replied saying that I have conflicts at that time, how about we do it next week? Didn't hear back from him for a couple of days, and then he replied saying he's too busy next week. OK then, can you let me know when you're free? Never heard from him again. Sounded very unprofessional to me.
  - yurishimo 5y ago
    Nah, they just want to find the people who are enthusiastically looking to join their organization. They want the mindless drone who will do what they're told and when asked to jump, reply with "how high?" You didn't meet that criteria otherwise you would have bent over backwards to adjust your schedule to make the proposed time, so "obviously" you don't really want this job enough.
kar5pt 5y ago
Amazon is the only FAANG recruiter I ignore. Working 60 hour weeks just so I can get PIPed within 9 months of starting? No thanks.
- mrep 5y ago
  Your mileage may very but I only worked 40 hours a week when I was there and I also got promoted in about a year and a half.
  - ipaddr 5y ago
    Why did you leave?
    - mrep 5y ago
      GOOG pay + benefits > AMZN. No on-call at GOOG too which is nice and I get to work for Google maps which is like my favorite software application as I use it every time I drive. I'd consider going back for a fully remote job with like a 35% pay bump though. Although if I'm just going for the money, I'd probably switch to one of the trading firms that have been hounding me. Got one email recently for a fully remote job with compensation wide open (anywhere from 275k-650k+).
  - azemetre 5y ago
    You have to understand their concern though, there are so many terrible stories about working for Amazon that it seems to be the expected norm rather than the reverse. What's even worse is that it permeates throughout the entire company, every division, every org. You have this article written nearly 7-years ago: https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-wrestling-big-ideas-in-a-bruising-workplace.html https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-... Money quote: > “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.” The culture only seems to have gotten worse. Another person posted elsewhere but Amazon seems to be doing anything they can but actually fixing their toxic culture. I've worked one bad job and there's no amount of money I would accept to mitigate the loss in quality of sleep, becoming depressed when going to work, and dreading when I had to communicate with anyone.
CoastalCoder 5y ago
> Doubt more money is going to fix this though perhaps ... There's certainly some amount of money that would get me to work for them in the short term. But only if there wasn't a clawback clause that made me lose money if I found the experience unhealthy.
potatolicious 5y ago
Yep, ditto my experience here. Amazon is far and away the company that reaches out most aggressively - which is generally fine - but what's very annoying is that the jobs they want me to apply for are so poorly targeted. I have probably about a dozen emails from AWS even though I've been doing mobile apps for the past >10 years and that's readily evident if you even bothered looking at my CV. I can't think of another major company whose recruiters spend so little effort pitching a relevant role to the candidate. At this point I don't even open the emails any more - which seems like it's long-term detrimental to their recruitment efforts overall.

joshgachnang 5y ago

I get at least 5x the emails from Amazon as Google/Microsoft/Facebook. And lately I've told every single one until they have fully remote teams, I'm not interested and to stop emailing me. And yet almost every other week, a new one messages me.

tdeck 5y ago

> During the height of the pandemic I got one wanting me to move to Ireland to work in an Amazon office there. There's probably some engineer out there who's always wanted to live in Ireland. That said, I imagine if you're in the "hire to fire" bucket it would suck extra to be in anouther country with no job.

anonporridge 5y ago

Amazon chickens coming home to roost.

aantix 5y ago

Agree. Looking at HN, Blind, Glassdoor, very rarely do I remember seeing an engineer that would openly state that they love working there.

Kranar 5y ago
Plenty of software developers would kill to work for Amazon, sure the work conditions and prestige is not as great as the other big companies but Amazon still pays pretty darn well. The big issue is the developers Amazon wants to hire are not the same as the developers who want to work there, so Amazon is basically paying a huge premium to attract people. That said let's not kid ourselves, the majority of people at Amazon are happy to be there, get paid very well, and are reasonably competent.
- aantix 5y ago
  Clearly with their base pay and RSUs, they still weren't offering enough. A doubling of base pay means that they realize they have been way off the mark.
- munk-a 5y ago
  I don't know how well that impression is born out by the generally short tenures and increasing growth of base pay that we're observing. Lots of decently large tech firms pay well beyond Amazon's rates and manage to retain people for far longer - this move specifically seems to be highlighting that the compensation Amazon was offering was insufficient for the pain employees were being burdened with. I do also think FAANG built up a reputation for inaccessibility to intermediate devs which gives them an air of prestige but also significantly impairs their hiring ability.
davidrupp 5y ago
I'm a senior SDE (L6) @ AMZN (currently IMDb) with seven years tenure -- opinions my own, obvs. I've had some negative experiences with individuals / organizations over that time, but on balance I can honestly say I love working here. It is quite possible to get maneuvered into a bad situation such that you end up having to leave through no real fault of your own, but it's also possible to find a good fit and do exactly what the motto says: "Work hard, have fun, make history".
yolovoe 5y ago
I work at Amazon. Less than 2 yoe but is comp is solid, even compared to Goog and Meta, perhaps cause I'm currently top of band. Wlb is amazing. Did 5-6 hour days on last team. Coworkers were chill. Now I work more (6-7 hour days) cause I'm on a systems team, but I get to learn a lot about how EC2 servers are run. My manager cares about my learning and I get basically an hour a week with the tech lead where I can ask them questions. Have been able to meet a couple principal engineers and they've even reviewed some of my work. I have nothing bad to shared about my experience so far. Did I mention I don't have deadlines?

laweijfmvo 5y ago

Amazon recruiting is a disaster. I’m used to receiving a reach out once or twice a year, but late last year I had at least four recruiters reaching out, three simultaneously. I think one even attempted to automate the process because I received two separate emails from him along with follow ups on each in a matter of four hours, and my replies never got through as they were completely ignored as he continued to follow up (on both original emails) several times over the next week.

dralley 5y ago
> I think one even attempted to automate the process because I received two separate emails from him along with follow ups on each in a matter of four hours, and my replies never got through as they were completely ignored as he continued to follow up (on both original emails) several times over the next week. This happened to me. I got the exact same recruiting email from the exact same recruiter a week after I had already responded by declining.
1024core 5y ago
Amazon Recruiting is indeed a disaster. I got approached by an Amazon recruiter, and instead of just ignoring him, I decided to see "what's out there". I'm a staff SWE level at a decent company, so not exactly desperate to leave. He proposed a hard time for a phone call later that week. I replied saying that I have conflicts at that time, how about we do it next week? Didn't hear back from him for a couple of days, and then he replied saying he's too busy next week. OK then, can you let me know when you're free? Never heard from him again. Sounded very unprofessional to me.
- yurishimo 5y ago
  Nah, they just want to find the people who are enthusiastically looking to join their organization. They want the mindless drone who will do what they're told and when asked to jump, reply with "how high?" You didn't meet that criteria otherwise you would have bent over backwards to adjust your schedule to make the proposed time, so "obviously" you don't really want this job enough.

kar5pt 5y ago

Amazon is the only FAANG recruiter I ignore. Working 60 hour weeks just so I can get PIPed within 9 months of starting? No thanks.

mrep 5y ago
Your mileage may very but I only worked 40 hours a week when I was there and I also got promoted in about a year and a half.
- ipaddr 5y ago
  Why did you leave?
  - mrep 5y ago
    GOOG pay + benefits > AMZN. No on-call at GOOG too which is nice and I get to work for Google maps which is like my favorite software application as I use it every time I drive. I'd consider going back for a fully remote job with like a 35% pay bump though. Although if I'm just going for the money, I'd probably switch to one of the trading firms that have been hounding me. Got one email recently for a fully remote job with compensation wide open (anywhere from 275k-650k+).
- azemetre 5y ago
  You have to understand their concern though, there are so many terrible stories about working for Amazon that it seems to be the expected norm rather than the reverse. What's even worse is that it permeates throughout the entire company, every division, every org. You have this article written nearly 7-years ago: https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-wrestling-big-ideas-in-a-bruising-workplace.html https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/16/technology/inside-amazon-... Money quote: > “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.” The culture only seems to have gotten worse. Another person posted elsewhere but Amazon seems to be doing anything they can but actually fixing their toxic culture. I've worked one bad job and there's no amount of money I would accept to mitigate the loss in quality of sleep, becoming depressed when going to work, and dreading when I had to communicate with anyone.

CoastalCoder 5y ago

> Doubt more money is going to fix this though perhaps ... There's certainly some amount of money that would get me to work for them in the short term. But only if there wasn't a clawback clause that made me lose money if I found the experience unhealthy.

potatolicious 5y ago

Yep, ditto my experience here. Amazon is far and away the company that reaches out most aggressively - which is generally fine - but what's very annoying is that the jobs they want me to apply for are so poorly targeted. I have probably about a dozen emails from AWS even though I've been doing mobile apps for the past >10 years and that's readily evident if you even bothered looking at my CV. I can't think of another major company whose recruiters spend so little effort pitching a relevant role to the candidate. At this point I don't even open the emails any more - which seems like it's long-term detrimental to their recruitment efforts overall.