What was working at AWS and, later, Amazon’s mothership in Seattle like, you ask? As with any time at a huge corporation, especially one for which you relocated yourself and your family*, it’s complicated, but if you’re looking for pure metrics, which would be very Amazonian of you, have at it. Presented without (much) further comment, here’s a selection of my personal statistics – no seekrit project information or team details, obviously – over my not-quite 4 years:
- 3 teams
- 3 roles/5 job titles**
- 7 managers
- 18 direct reports
- 3 laptops
- 4 buildings
- 9 desk locations
- 121 PhoneTool icons (for the uninitiated, it’s A Thing)
- 83.55% Old Fart (the internal tracking of employees hired after me – so I was in the most-tenured 16.45%)
- 3 other offices visited, 1 in the US, 2 in other countries
- 12+ master global taxonomies managed, with millions of terms in each and and in each local marketplace variation: Prime Video, Kindle, US Books, US DVD, US CDs, Digital Music, Audible, Handmade, Interests, some other oddities
- SO MANY papers written: 1-pagers, 6-pagers, etc.
I’m excited about my next challenge to be named shortly, but am very much enjoying my needed break before jumping in – and finally having the chance to get back to beer blogging!
* This is something I can speak openly about – the relocation package and the team were great, even with our cats
** I was actually recruited initially as ‘Content Product Manager’ though that got superseded by more Amazon-specific internal titles over time – but I really liked that one, I admit