Posted: 8/13/2016 12:06:25 AM EDT
| Specifically a fulfillment center? I'm waiting for my offer letter for a Supervisor/Team lead position and just wondering what to expect. I've been at my current job for 4 years and I'm not looking forward to starting over, but I'm looking forward to another start. |
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No first hand knowledge here - just the general hubub from years ago when fullfullment centers were hot/not-aircondintioned and workers had to clock out before exiting through all the security shakedowns (a long procedure).
Good luck! It'd be interesting to hear your insight |
| The person I know that worked in a similar job description in an Amazon fulfillment center did not give the job a glowing review. It sounds like Amazon has attempted to stupid-proof the entire operation, rendering even the "autonomous" jobs pretty inane and regimented. However, he said that their benefits were pretty solid. Best of luck to you. |
I knew a math professor who worked for Amazon. He came to the US after the collapse of the Soviet Union. While in Russia, he worked for 5 years doing operations research. He worked for Amazon for 4 months as a research scientist doing the same thing, and he made damn good money. He said that it was awful, and that working for the Soviet Union was better by a significant margin, even accounting for wages. 
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They have a well-known reputation for being a shit company to work for, specifically corporate. I have never heard a past or present employee not specifically use the words "soul sucking" or "soul draining" when describing it. I believe in getting all you can get from people but it sounds like amazon goes overboard. |
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I interviewed there for a Area Lead position. It's the lowest salaried position in a fulfillment center (Operations Manager is the next level). It's pretty grueling, especially during the holidays. Don't expect to have much of a work life balance 4th quarter, at all. A lot of your salary is in vested stock options too (I think the compensation came to like $90-95k but only $75k was salary the rest was 4 year vested stock). I didn't get the job because according to the recruiter "we want to find something better to do with your 10lb brain then work in a fulfillment center at this position". Now at the time I was unemployeed so I was pretty pissed. Especially since my cousin refferred me and Amazon paid for me to travel to chattanooga, put me up in a hotel, gave me a tour of the center and I interviewed with like 10 people. My cousin has worked with them for 5 years now and has moved up the ranks pretty well starting at area manager and makes very good money as a roving operations manager now going from site to site which makes his balance a bit better. Each center is pretty much handled differently too. Amazon grows so fast they never stop to catch up so it's up to each center to hopefully have managers to unfuck things and help with process improvement. In hindsight i'm kind of glad I didn't get the job because i would have had to move and not seeing my wife for 3-4 months straight each year doesn't sound very appealing. That being said, if I was younger with a lot less experience and wanted a place to work my way up the ladder and was single with no kids i'd probably do it. If you spend 5-10 years there and build up a shitload of stock you can go somewhere else and get a better job and have a really sweet nest egg or use it to buy a house or something. There is an hourly line employee at one of the Chattanooga centers that was with them for 10-15 (she transferred in when they opened that center) years and had so much stock she drives and S class Mercedes (paid off) and has a paid off house and shows up, works her 8 hours shifts for $15 an hour and goes home with not a care in the world lol. |
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I worked at one of the PHX Fulfillment Centers for 4 years.
Expect to hustle. I started as temp on the floor. Out of the 40 people in my group. Only one girl and myself were hired on full time. Everyone else got let go. If you are the typical, lazy, low initiative Millennial, don't go looking for a job there. There area lot of prior service people in the AZ centers. I liked it and had no plans for going elsewhere. A family illness forced me to leave AZ for a while and so had to quit. |
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Everybody hates success in America. You go OP! Follow their stupid rules, watch your 6, stay PC, and always ask "How can we make this quicker/easier for the customer?" Backstab your way up the chain. Not wanting to work for a shitty employer is "hating success in America?" LOL |
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Specifically a fulfillment center? I'm waiting for my offer letter for a Supervisor/Team lead position and just wondering what to expect. I've been at my current job for 4 years and I'm not looking forward to starting over, but I'm looking forward to another start. For a couple of months last year between jobs, wasn't any kind of Lead or Supervisor just packaging, quotas are high, no a/c, I stayed busy but it was still the longest 10 hour shifts I've ever worked, lots of security which didn't bother me, got wanded because I forgot to take a roll of Tums out of my pocket, felt like a rented mule for $10.50, supervisor may be better.. |
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Not wanting to work for a shitty employer is "hating success in America?" LOL Quoted:
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Everybody hates success in America. You go OP! Follow their stupid rules, watch your 6, stay PC, and always ask "How can we make this quicker/easier for the customer?" Backstab your way up the chain. Not wanting to work for a shitty employer is "hating success in America?" LOL Please specify what is shitty about them. Like I posted above, I've actually worked for them for years. But then again, I was good at the job, they liked me and I successful. So that colors my perspective. |
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I worked at one of the PHX Fulfillment Centers for 4 years. Expect to hustle. I started as temp on the floor. Out of the 40 people in my group. Only one girl and myself were hired on full time. Everyone else got let go. If you are the typical, lazy, low initiative Millennial, don't go looking for a job there. There area lot of prior service people in the AZ centers. I liked it and had no plans for going elsewhere. A family illness forced me to leave AZ for a while and so had to quit. The first post with actual information so far. First, the FC's ARE heated/cooled. That is of no help to you if you are working inside a truck loading/unloading, or down-stacking heavy/bulky items, but that's generally not a manager's job. Everyone (except sometimes for front office) wears basketball clothes and walking shoes, so you are comfortable, but even manager's can expect to walk between 6 and 12 miles per day. If you pitch in from time to time (as is expected), you will sweat. Pickers and some other roles walk at least 10 miles every day anyway, and these are all kinds of people of all ages, some of whom can really kick ass, so being unable or unwilling to sweat does not reflect well. Standard weeks are 4x10, but that is in reality 12-14hrs due to travel time, the fact that lunch and breaks (1hr total) don't count toward that figure, and that manager's can expect to arrive about an hour early and leave an hour late to prepare their areas for the hourly workers, give or receive briefings at end of shift hand-offs, and handle other administrative tasks. Days don't often get longer than that, but the number of days worked in the week does expand during peak times. Hourly workers have assigned OT days, and mandatory OT and vacation black-outs are called based upon business need. The whole reason 38 people were let go in the above example probably has more to do with the fact that they simply weren't needed after Q4, when volumes return to more normal levels. College students, retirees, and all kinds of other people are brought in for the seasonal expansion, and then sent home. Several different health/dental options are available based upon your needs, and the cost will vary accordingly. Not the greatest 401k match in the world, but it is offered. The salary and stock option figures quoted above are inaccurate (on the way low side), but could vary depending upon the recruiting source (college hires, veterans, graduate programs, industry-lateral, internal promotions, etc). They do NOT disclose their pay structure, so even two people on the same level could have wildly differing pay. The horror stories from the news about working at corporate aren't necessarily untrue, but just consider how few people that actually was, and the fact that every workplace is going to have a few bad managers who just make everyone around them hate life, exercise poor judgment, or whatever. There are feedback mechanisms for EVERYONE, but the extent to which you have a vicious, back-stabbing culture is not a result of that process, just a reflection that your group might have a lot of vicious people. Everyone can be as self-serving or cooperative as they want to be. Honest mistakes are tolerated as long as you don't make them more than once. Honest differences of opinion are tolerated as long as you are well informed. Results at any cost is NOT the preferred way--hourly workers can leave at any time, and their pay/rewards don't vary much whether the building makes its numbers or not--so if you are a jerk, they WILL punish you by walking out at a critical moment. They want the same thing in a boss that you would want: autonomy, fairness, impartiality, flexibility, and understanding for their personal concerns as far as the law, policy, and business need will allow. Being humble and willing to work your ass off goes a long way. Key phrases used 100 times per day include: "Please", "Thank you", "I don't understand, please show/remind me", "I don't know, but I will find out", and "How can I help?" It is very, very difficult to make the improvements that everyone would like to see when you are already so busy running the operation you have right now, warts and all. There is an expectation that managers manage to the maximum capabilities of the people/processes/facilities they have right now, before ever considering capital expenditures to solve a problem. If you haven't got those things to the point of humming along at max, or making it stretch until it breaks, then you haven't really identified where to spend the money, have you? "In God we trust; all others bring data"! |