"Needed therapy" is such a click-baity deliberate inflation of drama before we even get to the story. That alone caused me to look for a counter-argument, from someone who worked there, not their wife, or colleague, but an actual employee.
(warning, no drama, no neglected infants, no angry wives)
And btw, the claim that Amazon "encourages employees to tear apart one another's ideas" is also dramatic. Actually, I've seen the opposite happen where nobody says anything "nasty" about anyone's ideas for fear of deviating from the "positive work culture". Bad ideas can go a long way before they're spotted if you're not willing to speak up.
Tearing shreds sounds to me like an opportunity to cut through the bullshit. It doesn't need to be personal, the mission is bigger than the individual. Ego should be put aside. Maybe I should try working at Amazon.
A manager at my former workplace from years ago, let's call it News Corp, said to the technical team of 30 in a meeting once "the reason we are here [at the company] is to make each other look good". I was a pretty cheeky dev back then, but that day I didn't say anything. In my mind I thought "no, we're here to make the online products and services look good".
You can invest time worrying about how things look or how things are, not both. Too much positivity or eggshell-treading or dancing around the truth and high-fiving when discussing or evaluating ideas can be an invisible poison for any business.
(warning, no drama, no neglected infants, no angry wives)
https://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/201x/2015/08/16/Working-a...
And btw, the claim that Amazon "encourages employees to tear apart one another's ideas" is also dramatic. Actually, I've seen the opposite happen where nobody says anything "nasty" about anyone's ideas for fear of deviating from the "positive work culture". Bad ideas can go a long way before they're spotted if you're not willing to speak up.
Tearing shreds sounds to me like an opportunity to cut through the bullshit. It doesn't need to be personal, the mission is bigger than the individual. Ego should be put aside. Maybe I should try working at Amazon.
A manager at my former workplace from years ago, let's call it News Corp, said to the technical team of 30 in a meeting once "the reason we are here [at the company] is to make each other look good". I was a pretty cheeky dev back then, but that day I didn't say anything. In my mind I thought "no, we're here to make the online products and services look good".
You can invest time worrying about how things look or how things are, not both. Too much positivity or eggshell-treading or dancing around the truth and high-fiving when discussing or evaluating ideas can be an invisible poison for any business.