Amazon Web Services reviews

Weak vacation policy Company wants to let go a certain percentage of employees each year to “raise the bar” Politics of prioritization and planning can leave you in a position where you do a bunch of meaningless work that ends up mothballed shortly before launch, resulting in having nothing to show for the year and being put under performance review.

They say you have all the resources in the world; you just have to go find them, haha. My managers, who went through 3 in 16 months, were very clueless about the industry and what the day-to-day should look like. They couldn't support me on customer calls - I was on my own. Again, the motto was "You have to network, and we have all the resources at your fingertips." I was initially in a co-sell motion. The account managers that I supported didn't invite me to a single meeting because they were afraid of exerting too much influence over the accounts. Neither my managers nor their managers could do anything about it. Then, I got my own territory based on my high KPIs. After 16 months of pushing myself day and night (acquiring white hairs for the first time), learning, training, networking, and basically learning the business all by myself, I finally developed the right relationships with partners and clients. This allowed me to create a multi-billion dollar portfolio of large and significant projects that would provide high YoY Growth recurring revenue for at least the next 5 years. Finally, I got to a place where I felt like I had made it. We finally purchased our new home (paid the deposit and signed the contract), and 3 days later, I was laid off. My new manager was confused because we were in the middle of planning out our next steps for a $1.2M deal when I got the email. What made things worse was that they would not allow remote work. So, we bypassed our dream home in the country and moved closer to the city to stay with AWS. Imagine having no job, thousands already spent on a deposit, a mortgage on the line because of no employment, and having to move to the city for a job that's not there. Using internal contacts, the HR person said it was based on the very high salary, which was true because I was paid very high compared to my peers. I was replaced with an intern confirmed via LinkedIn and an engineer who still works to support my team. One of my other peers had to move from California, lost custody of his daughter, signed a lease for $50K, and got laid off. Another sold his house in NY, drove to their new house at the airport, and got the layoff email. There are thousands of stories like this. This is one of the most heartless organizations on the face of the planet. Not only do they put extreme pressure on you to perform, present internally for no purpose, kill thousands of hours with useless networking, and engage in other stupid activities, but they also let you go because they paid you too much. When Apple had to cut jobs, they took the most humane route, giving folks plenty of time to prepare their next move (6 months or more) and already providing another job for them in another department. Also, you will have no life here. They will brainwash you with "AWS this" and "AWS that" and blow smoke and hype. But at the end of the day, you will lose precious time not spending it with your spouse, children, friends, family, and yourself. You need time to comprehend that you are human and to experience other parts of life. Work should be a means to live, not the other way around. I wish I knew this before I joined. I got blinded by the ringer and the money they offered, and in the end, they took it all back, even though I was very successful right before leaving.