Analysis of Amazon's Hiring and Retention Process

The Misalignment at Amazon

The essay evaluates the process of employee hiring and retention at Amazon. While rated as one of the most excellent organizations in the world, Amazon it is also one of the worst firms to work with (Stone & D\u2019Onfro, 2015).

The Culture of Frugality and Customer Obsession

The firm is more obsessed with customers at the expense of employees. The organization, for instance, espouse a culture of frugality, where so much is accomplished without necessarily investing a lot. On the contrary, the culture of frugality prohibits ingenuity, autonomy, invention and also turns off many prospective employees (Stone & D\u2019Onfro, 2015).

In the same breadth, Amazon does not provide basics such as lunches to its workforce nor does the firm provide exceptional fully paid insurance for employees. At some point, the company has implemented 19th and 20th century business models where workers are put under surveillance 24/7 (Stone & D\u2019Onfro, 2015). It is therefore this customer obsession that makes the firm unable to hire and retain some of the best employees, especially when fringe benefits are scanty to come by. On the flip side of it, the culture of frugality has made it necessary to keep prices low, an issue that has fueled the firm\u2019s growth.

The Performance Improvement Plan (PIP)

The company has a performance improvement plan (PIP) that should help underperforming employees rather productive. Although the PIP model should help employees in skill development, the organization does not provide any training or mentorship to employees, which makes the program as a process to getting rid of employees. In reference to the RAEW tool, this amounts to responsibility without expertise. As a misalignment, the PIP approach is demoralizing to workers since it does not serve as a pathway for career growth; instead it is used to fire workers.

Nonetheless, apart from the digital systems used to screen employees and determine whether they are meeting their daily targets, these systems have metrics to quantify the tonnage in terms of work for each employee, especially those that work in fulfilling centers (Stone & D\u2019Onfro 2015).

Deployment Overseas and Lack of Investment in Equipment

In addition, the company has also deployed overseas to gather firsthand information about the way things are getting along. In light with the RAEW tool, this approach is tantamount to affording employees the responsibility without authority. Experience demonstrates that employees that work and minimal supervision are more productive and feel part of the larger process than when put under surveillance (Dundon, Cullinane & Wilkinson, 2017). Ultimately, this culminates into disenfranchised and underperforming employees.

Moreover, the aspect of authority without responsibility is evident at Amazon, especially when the company fails to invest in state-of-the-art equipment for employees to use yet expects employees to realize employee needs under heavy technological scrutiny. By and large, this misalignment makes working at Amazon disempowering hence high employee turnover.

Resolving the Misalignment

To resolves the misalignment, Amazon should open up channels of communication and ensure data is easily accessible across different business segments to enhance productivity. This in turn ensures that workers take responsibility, especially when goals and obligations of team members are properly defined. Moreover, the leadership should promote transparency among employees just as is the case for clients. While this improves the morale of employees, it not only allows them to take ownership but also some sense of achievement. Nonetheless, for effective collaboration, the top management should engage teams, review the corporate culture and systems and work towards improving everything (Dundon, Cullinane & Wilkinson, 2017). This top-down teamwork will eliminate silos as Amazon an issue that will culminate to improved performance. Whereas continuous training is essentially for employees and the company, Amazon has to ensure they put in place a system that takes care of this. On the other hand, the firm should embrace a high-retention strategy by remunerating employees handsomely.

References

Dundon, T., Cullinane, N., & Wilkinson, A. (2017). A very short, fairly interesting and       reasonably cheap book about employment relations. SAGE.

Stone M & D’Onfro, J. (Aug 12, 2015). Employees confess the worst parts about working for      Amazon. Retrieved February 1, 2018 from http://www.businessinsider.com/the-worst-          parts-about-working-at-amazon-according-to-employees-2015-8?IR=T