Jeff described Amazon this way: “Our culture is four things: customer obsession instead of competitor obsession; willingness to think long term, with a longer investment horizon than most of our peers; eagerness to invent, which of course goes hand in hand with failure; and then, finally, taking professional pride in operational excellence.” (Location 48)
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He truly embodies the Amazon motto, “Work hard, have fun, make history.” (Location 98)
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“We need to plant many seeds,” he would say, “because (Location 129)
we don’t know which one of those seeds will grow into a mighty oak.” (Location 130)
‘You can work long, hard, or smart, but at Amazon.com you can’t choose two out of three.’” (Location 269)
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What distinguishes Amazon is that its Leadership Principles are deeply ingrained in every significant process and function at the company. (Location 287)
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If, for example, a person spoke up at a meeting and suggested an idea that was obviously geared toward short-term considerations and ignored significant longer-term ones, or proposed something that was competitor- rather than customer-centric, there would be an uncomfortable pause before someone pointed out what was on everyone else’s mind. (Location 292)
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We know and remember Amazon’s principles because they are the basic framework used for making decisions and taking action. (Location 337)
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S-Team goals are aggressive enough that Amazon only expects about three-quarters of them to be fully achieved during the year. Hitting every one of them would be a clear sign that the bar had been set too low. (Location 442)
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“Leaders operate at all levels, stay connected to the details, audit frequently, and are skeptical when metrics and anecdotes differ. No task is beneath them.” (Location 448)
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There are eight steps in the Bar Raiser hiring process: Job Description Résumé Review Phone Screen In-House Interview Written Feedback Debrief/Hiring Meeting Reference Check Offer Through Onboarding (Location 711)
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The method that Amazon interviewers use for drilling down goes by the acronym STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result): “What was the situation?” “What were you tasked with?” “What actions did you take?” “What was the result?” (Location 801)
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The Bar Raiser process is designed to minimize personal bias and maximize making data-based hiring decisions based on the substance of each candidate’s work and how that work maps to a set of principles. (Location 945)
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Each overlap created one kind of dependency, which describes something one team needs but can’t supply for itself. If my team’s work requires effort from yours—whether it’s to build something new, participate, or review—you’re one of my dependencies. Conversely, if your team needs something from mine, I’m a dependency of yours. (Location 1020)
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When you view effective communication across groups as a “defect,” the solutions to your problems start to look quite different from traditional ones. (Location 1120)
Amazon’s belief that focusing on controllable input metrics instead of output metrics drives meaningful growth. (Location 1181)
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Morale is, in a sense, an output metric, whereas freedom to invent and build is an input metric. If you clear the impediment to building, morale takes care of itself. (Location 1182)
Sometimes it’s best to start slow in order to move fast. (Location 1291)
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Such teams have clear, unambiguous ownership of specific features or functionality and can drive innovations with a minimum of reliance or impact upon others. (Location 1379)
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The STL delivers high-velocity innovation, which in turn makes Amazon nimble and responsive even at its now-massive scale. Free of the hindrance of excess dependencies, innovators at every level can experiment and innovate faster, leading to more sharply defined products and a higher level of engagement for their creators. (Location 1397)
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Ownership and accountability are much easier to establish under the STL model, keeping teams properly focused and accurately aligned with company strategies. While all these positive outcomes were possible before the first autonomous single-threaded team was created, now they have become the natural and expected consequence of this very Amazonian model for innovation. (Location 1399)
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First-time writers will do well to review and learn from successful examples. (Location 1666)
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Our goal has been to leave two-thirds of the meeting time for discussing what we’ve read. (Location 1673)
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Some groups at Amazon go around the room, ask for high-level feedback, then pore over the document line by line. Other groups ask a single individual to give all their feedback on the entire document, then ask the next person in the audience to do the same. (Location 1681)
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It’s vital that we capture and record the salient points of the ensuing discussion, as those comments become part of the output of the narrative process. (Location 1690)
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You are not just commenting on a document, you’re helping to shape an idea, and thereby becoming a key team member for that business. (Location 1697)
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He responded with a simple and useful tip that I have not forgotten: he assumes each sentence he reads is wrong until he can prove otherwise. He’s challenging the content of the sentence, not the motive of the writer. Jeff, by the way, was usually among the last to finish reading. (Location 1705)
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“Here’s our best effort. Tell us where we fell short.” (Location 1723)
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Either way, if the narrative process works to its fullest potential, you’re all in it together. (Location 1732)
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the FAQ section is where the writer shares the details of the plan from a consumer point of view and addresses the various risks and challenges from internal operations, technical, product, marketing, legal, business development, and financial points of view. (Location 1872)
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If the press release doesn’t describe a product that is meaningfully better (faster, easier, cheaper) than what is already out there, or results in some stepwise change in customer experience, then it isn’t worth building. (Location 1879)
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Consumer Needs and Total Addressable Market (TAM) How many consumers have this need or problem? How big is the need? For how many consumers is this problem big enough that they are willing to spend money to do something about it? If so, how much money would they be willing to spend? How many of these consumers have the characteristics/capabilities/constraints necessary to make use of the product? (Location 2035)
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It is important to note that, during our time with Amazon, most PR/FAQs never made it to a stage where they were launched as actual products. What this means is that a product manager will put in a lot of time exploring product ideas that never get to market. This may be because of the intense competition for resources and capital among the hundreds of PR/FAQs that are authored and presented each year within the company. (Location 2095)
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