Comment by LVB

Comment by LVB 3 days ago

9 replies

While it may be comforting to think you're just sticking it to "Amazon", if you look at almost anything you're doing, you're going to see other people who are really at the other end of this apathy. Whether it's co-workers you're blocking or giving half-effort to, customers being ignored, or the new engineer that is neglected.

Is there some purely "amoral object like Amazon" stuff that's part of it too? Sure. But at least in my experience, folks who are just phoning it in cause real stress for coworkers and others, and that definitely relates to personal integrity.

okwhateverdude 3 days ago

Man, all of that sounds awful for those coworkers and customers. But it isn't GPs problem. It isn't their company. He doesn't employ them. He isn't responsible for their experience. Put the blame on their poor experience squarely where it belongs: management. Why is shitty management letting some underperformer ruin things? Super convenient to claim personal integrity and shift the blame to the underperformer when management is clearly not demonstrating personal integrity and protecting their team and customers.

  • keikobadthebad 3 days ago

    That's a good point: demotivating people and making them leave, having all those side effects on bystanders... it's all coming from the management decision.

    And this is Amazon, they are normally so careful about mental suffering of coworkers... ...

  • kiratp 3 days ago

    It is the GP’s problem when this coworkers don’t want to work with them again.

    The tech hubs (SF, Seattle, NYC are pretty small communities.

    • oblio 3 days ago

      Any place that has hundreds of thousands of tech workers isn't small.

      In a town of 50k people you'll die not knowing probably 80% of them.

    • beacon294 3 days ago

      They are small in a sense and vast in a sense. You may know some people personally but never interact with them at work even though in theory your systems are adjacent.

  • tarsinge 3 days ago

    A company doesn’t physically exist, the reality is people interacting with each others. People are not responsible for others whole experience, but certainly for their actions. You can’t hide behind non-existent things, you are having a real interaction in the real world and impacting real people. Otherwise it leads to systemic evil.

    • voltaireodactyl 3 days ago

      I think the prior commenter’s point might be more clearly stated as “why hold rank and file employees responsible for overall conditions within the company, rather than those actually responsible for overall conditions within the company [management].”

    • cameldrv 3 days ago

      A person doesn’t physically exist. It’s just a bunch of cells interacting with each other. Likewise a cell doesn’t really exist, it’s just a bunch of proteins and lipids, but likewise those are just a bunch of atoms, which are just a bunch of subatomic particles!

      Anyhow, corporations exist just as much as any other collective entity and have their own behavioral norms.

    • oblio 3 days ago

      What if the system is evil by design? You are already at the "systemic evil" step, from the start.