Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos has responded to a recent New York Times report, in which the online retail giant is labeled a “bruising workplace,” among other things.
In a memo to employees obtained by the NYT, Bezos said the publication was wrong to depict the company as “a soulless, dystopian workplace where no fun is had and no laughter heard.”
“I don’t think any company adopting the approach portrayed [in the NYT article] could survive, much less thrive, in today’s highly competitive tech hiring market,” he said.
Bezos went on to say: “I don’t recognize this Amazon and I very much hope you don’t, either.”
The NYT story featured insight from more than 100 current and former Amazon workers. One particularly shocking story mentioned in the report came from a former human resources executive who said she was required to put a woman who just had a stillborn child on a “performance improvement plan.”
“I had just experienced the most devastating event in my life,” the woman told the NYT. She was reportedly told that her work would be monitored “to make sure my focus stayed on my job.”
In his note to employees, Bezos said the company will not tolerate the “shockingly callous management practices” described in the story. Any worker who is aware of “stories like those reported” should contact Bezos personally.
“Even if it’s rare or isolated, our tolerance for any such lack of empathy needs to be zero,” he explained.
Overall, Bezos said his employees should give the NYT story “a careful read.” But he cautioned that the story “doesn’t describe the Amazon I know or the caring Amazonians I work with every day.”
In other recent news about Amazon, the company’s internal video game division–Amazon Game Studios–has lost two of its key employees: Clint Hocking and Eric Nylund. There’s no indication that their departure is in any way related to Amazon’s work culture.
What did you make of the NYT‘s story about Amazon’s culture? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
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