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Amazon Reaches New High Of 268,900 Employees -- Skyrocketing 47% In Just One Year (geekwire.com)

Posted by msmash on from the growing-trend dept.

Amazon remains one of the biggest attractors of talent worldwide. During its quarterly earnings, the company said it hired 23,700 employees in the second quarter -- making the total employee headcount at the company 268,900. GeekWire reports: Amazon's headcount has grown by a staggering amount over the last few years. Its employment numbers increased close to 10 percent in the last three months and 47 percent over a year ago, when its employee count stood at a paltry-by-comparison 183,100 people. That's an increase of 85,800 employees in one year -- more than the entire city of Bellingham, Wash.Related: The New York Times report on work challenges at Amazon.

9 of 44 comments (clear)

  1. Game developer friend just left Amazon by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Quantity != Quality.

    A game developer friend of mine just left Amazon for greener pastures. There are many reasons he left but the two biggest were:

    * Compensation for good work is lacking,
    * Amazon still uses stack ranking.

    I asked him about this Amazon piece and he sadly agreed with it:

    http://www.geekwire.com/2015/o...

    So yeah, that's great Amazon is on a hiring spree for now. What's the turn over rate going to be in 1 - 5 years?
    How many people will enjoy what they are working on in 2+ years?

    --
    "Show me your code and I'll guess at your data,
    Show me your data and I'll know your code."

    1. Re:Game developer friend just left Amazon by plopez · · Score: 2

      I was going to make a comment about "The Mythical Man-Month", which applies to more than just software. The management complexity is going to increase dramatically. It will be interesting to see if they hit the wall soon.

      --
      putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
    2. Re:Game developer friend just left Amazon by tjhayes · · Score: 2

      You're really comparing apples and oranges. The overwhelming majority of the jobs that the article talks about amazon creating are low level warehouse jobs. Their volume has gown by leaps and bounds over the past few years and they need more folks to pack and ship those boxes.

    3. Re:Game developer friend just left Amazon by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 2

      Yup, I know most people go "What? Amazon makes game??"

      Yes, for a few years actually.

      They have a game studio:
      * https://games.amazon.com/

      And they recently (back in Feb, 2016) open sourced their AAA engine, Lumberyard, which is based on CryEngine. (See the FAQ)
      * https://aws.amazon.com/lumbery...

      Their AWS (Amazon Web Services) is used by game devs:
      * https://aws.amazon.com/gaming/

      My friend was actually in a non-gaming section, but they hire game devs due to their experience and mind set of solving technical problems.

  2. Re:Most are warehouse employees by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Only in the short term. In the medium term most warehouse employees will be automated away. Amazon bought Kiva Systems for a reason. https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
    This stuff from Amazon, and similar systems form competitors, is starting to get adopted on a massive scale. And not only at Amazon btw, although there business is specifically suited for systems like these.

    And after that there will be this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

  3. Re:Instant Deleivery by lgw · · Score: 3, Informative

    With that many employees you would think that they could dispatch a driver to personally deliver my package to my door!

    That's called "Prime Now" in a few cities, which is mostly for food delivery (including pizza), but I think you can get some other stuff (I know you can get beer).

    In Seattle where you can get Sunday delivery, the packages I've had delivered Sunday came somewhat like pizza - some guy in a beater car drove up, left the package on my doorstep, rang the bell, and drove off. (I'd bet he was carrying more than just my package, but it wasn't a delivery van or anything). Same day delivery seems to be a third party delivery service, though.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  4. Re:Most are warehouse employees by ranton · · Score: 2

    Outside of Seattle, Amazon resembles the backend of Wal-mart more than anything else.

    Oh yes, because only software engineers need jobs in this country. People stocking shelves hardly even count as human beings I guess.

    --
    -- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
  5. Re:Instant Deleivery by jratcliffe · · Score: 2

    In NYC, they've hired the USPS to do Sunday deliveries, just for Amazon packages. Weird to see a USPS truck with the back filled entirely with Amazon boxes. The USPS gets the extra revenue, the employees that want it get overtime, and people get their packages on Sunday. Pretty slick.

  6. BellingWhere? by thisisauniqueid · · Score: 2

    BellingWhere?