News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on Microsoft’s Downfall: Inside the Cannibalistic Culture That Felled a Tech Giant. Parent comment

Re:Microsoft’s Downfall: Inside the Cannibalistic Culture Th... by InclinedPlane on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @03:41PM (#4195815)
This was my experience as well. Working at MS, I wanted to leave after a few years because it was becoming obvious that the company was getting worse and worse over time. Working at Amazon, I wanted to leave after a few weeks, it felt like I had to gnaw my leg off to get out of that trap. I ended up leaving mid 5 figures in bonuses and non-vested stock on the table when I left after only a year.

I really like amazon from the outside, but their internal business culture in the development teams is just poison.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Microsoft’s Downfall: Inside the Cannibalistic Culture Th... by AndyKelley on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @04:03PM (#4195910)
I had a similar experience at Amazon.

I saw D players give B players scathing interview comments. It almost sounded more like they were scared of being replaced than actually evaluating the candidate.

I watched a teammate get promoted while I was putting out fires for and barely managing to keep running their horribly designed, over-complicated Java service, which really just needed to do CRUD.

I lasted 2 months before I started interviewing elsewhere, but I made it out in 8 months. I happily paid back the signing bonus and gave up the non-vested stock.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Microsoft’s Downfall: Inside the Cannibalistic Culture Th... by va_coder on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @05:58PM (#4196418)
Why is Amazon so dominant in e-commerce if the working conditions are so bad?
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Microsoft’s Downfall: Inside the Cannibalistic Culture Th... by InclinedPlane on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @06:08PM (#4196454)
I don't really have a good answer other than that in e-commerce software development is only a tiny part of the equation.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Microsoft’s Downfall: Inside the Cannibalistic Culture Th... by wisty on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @09:39PM (#4197193)
Everything in Amazon is a replaceable cog, especially the workers.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Microsoft’s Downfall: Inside the Cannibalistic Culture Th... by Daniel_Newby on Tuesday July 03, 2012 @06:32PM (#4196551)
Bezos is pretty good at business strategy, and from the outside it looks like upper management is good at forcing a workable product to be delivered come hell or high water.
[ Parent | on HN ]