Abstract

The case discusses about the workplace culture of Amazon.com Inc. (Amazon), the US based e-commerce giant. On August 16, 2015, the New York Times newspaper kicked off a controversy with a detailed article that described Amazon’s workplace as ‘bruising’. According to the article also criticized, Jeffery Bezos (Jeff), the founder & CEO of Amazon, for pushing the employees so hard that the work environment had become toxic. As per the allegations, the company forced its employees to work ignoring their family & other personal issues. The article also highlighted how the stringent and unfair evaluation processes and secret feedback system prevalent in the company had made the employees emotionally and physically ill. While Jeff denied the allegations, many existing and former employees of Amazon came forward to confirm and detail several incidents similar to those documented in the article. The case provides a background of the company, its growth and HR practices. It also highlights many incidences from the past when employees suffered because of Amazon’s practices. The case discusses the revamped policies of the company to undo some of the damage to its reputation. The case concludes with a key question whether Amazon would continue to sustain and scale its hard-charging culture.

Learning Objectives

The case is structured to achieve the following Learning Objectives:

• Analyze the culture of and its impact on a company.
• Infer the outcomes of employee satisfaction and dissatisfaction in a company.
• Relate organizational commitment with a firm’s performance.

Keywords

Amazon, Organizational Culture, Criticism , Practices over the years, Employees’ reactions, Combat Policies, Future speculations, Toxic Culture, Employee evaluation, Feedback system, Commitment, Productivity , Work environment