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Amazon India Chief Tells Employees To Maintain 'Work-Life Harmony', No Emails and Phone Calls After Office Hours (indiatimes.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: Amazon gets trashed on the international stage pretty often for its inhumane work conditions in its warehouses. However, it seems the Indian arm of the company is trying to do better, at least according to the latest announcement from Country Head Amit Agarwal. According to Business Standard, in an email to senior staff members this week, Agarwal has reportedly asked employees to leave themselves enough time to spend at home, and maintain a healthy "work-life harmony." He's told employees to stop taking calls and emails after hours, and specifically that, "No business decision should be made between 6 pm and 8 am." It's still unclear whether this decision comes from Agarwal or from the company's global leadership. Likely the latter, considering there's been no such chatter for US employees. It'll also be interesting to see how long this plan will hold, given the sheer size of the e-commerce portal. In the email, Agarwal also said that responding to emails while on vacation is "not cool."
That's for damn sure.
Finally, some good news for a change.
"Responding to emails while on vacation is not cool."
Sent from my sun lounger in Cancun.
Summation 2
I assume that this could not be universal, as they must have some people working at 'night' which would be the daytime state side.
âoeTolerance applies only to persons, but never to truth. Intolerance applies only to truth, but never to persons.
They have labour law there and can't fire some for just saying to no do an 80 hour day also working on holidays = X2 pay.
the US really needs more of the EU labor laws / OT
.. get back to work you lazy communists!!!! lol.
I love Americans, they wear their stressed lives like a badge of honor. Good for them I say.
I guess that means that all of the burden of evening/early-hour meetings with them goes to the people in other hemispheres.
That is all.
That's communist talk.
I work 5 jobs and have a shit home life, that makes me morally superior to the Euro-weenies who spend most of their time with their families/friends and get to spend waaaayyyy too much time enjoying their lives. And don't get me started on the Frenchies. They raise their kids IN PERSON not via text message. Pure laziness. They should be at work all day long!!!
Only in San Francisco
When all the workers who believed him and didn't answer the phone outside of 9-5 don't get an increase.
And all the workers who did pick up get a bonus.
Then it'll be back to business as usual.
Hmm. 80 hour day. Could you direct me to the person that has accomplished this? I'd really like to know how to increase my daily productivity even further. 24 hours simply isn't enough!
San Francisco is a man-poo minefield. It is fucking horrendous.
That would be laws for the people, by the people and thus socialist/communist. That would be unchristian to do. So not happening.
(Yeah, this logic has more holes than a Swiss cheese, but Switserland is not in the EU, so no probnlems there.)
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
I leave the office, the work phone goes into my laptop bag, and it bloody well stays there. These days, my laptop stays in the office chained to my desk.
I'm not on call, and you're not paying me for those hours, so don't think I'm going to answer the damned phone or reply to emails.
And since my manager refused to sign a timesheet which had overtime he didn't approve in advance, then he gets zero overtime. Yeah, I could stay another 30 minutes and finish this, but since you're not going to pay me, I'm not. If it takes me an hour and a half in the morning because I have to figure it out again, well, bummer.
Then again, I live in a place which has sensible labour laws which prevent my bosses from deciding they can demand anything they want, and terminate my employment for any stupid reason.
I'm not an indentured servant, fuck that. I leave the office for the day, and my workday is over.
He's sending this out to cover his ass, and make it look like he cares about his employees, but in the end, people will still be doing work after hours since they're attending 7.5hrs of meetings per day. So the only time to get Work Done (TM) is after hours.
If their basically free slaves will only work 40 hours a week, it still comes out to a super good deal.
It's still unclear whether this decision comes from Agarwal or from the company's global leadership. Likely the former, considering there's been no such chatter for US employees.
"Former" refers to the first of two earlier mentioned list items (Agarwal, in this case), while "latter" refers to the second (global leadership, in this case). If it were the latter, that would suggest there would be "chatter for US employees".
What we have in the US are powerful business groups who "nominate" our legislators for re-election through private campaign donations. Until all elections are financed by public funds, none of this will change: employment-at-will, binding arbitration, noncompete clauses, and reform of overtime for exempt employees.
in paris, yes.
Hmm. 80 hour day. Could you direct me to the person that has accomplished this? I'd really like to know how to increase my daily productivity even further. 24 hours simply isn't enough!
an 80 hour day is when you work four jobs at the same time for 20 hours a day.
Just another second banana
The next day Amit Agarwal announced that he was voluntarily leaving Amazon "to spend more time with his family".
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
You have no idea how India is changing, some of the new metro areas are world class. India will keep getting better, the US keeps getting worse , and there will always be shitty comments on Slashdot
Four Earth days in a cubic day.
A couple of points I'd like to bring up about this
While in general, I do agree that this should be the ideal, at the very least, if the company has clients overseas, there's a pretty good chance that the clients' business hours aren't going to always coincide with the company's. Practical business sense demands more flexibility than some hard-and-fast rule like like "no business decisions after 6pm" .
Secondly, it can come to pass from time to time that things need to be taken care of... immediately, to prevent potentially even permanently damaging issues. While this is more likely to be an issue for employees who function in a manager or supervisor role, it's very easy for me to imagine cases arising where if an employee decides that they've clocked out for the day and feel they aren't responsible for anything more, they might not get to clock in tomorrow because there's not going to be a company left to clock in to.
Now ideally, situations where an employee but it's stupidly naive to throw some kind of absolute rule around about when you will conduct your business without making any allowances for exceptions... and of course, an employee should also be justly compensated for their extra time on the occasions where it has been needed.
Finally, speaking for myself and from my own personal experience, I cannot stand to leave work when I have not yet felt like I've accomplished something constructive that day... I do not ask for compensation from my employer for this, because it is voluntary and not demanded of me, but if when I'm in the middle of some large programming task, I'd rather get it to some sort of point where I feel like I could leave it and pick up tomorrow instead of just dropping everything the minute the clock hits 5:30, where it can spell the difference between taking a couple of minutes to get myself back up to speed with where I was because I was at a point where a logical break is possible and having to take a an hour or more to basically completely mentally reinvent everything I did yesterday so that I can be on the same page that I was when I left the work at a point where no logical breakpoint can be found. Usually, this does not amount to staying too much longer, so I don't find it hinders my life balance in any way..
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
" in an email to senior staff members" Read senior. Those that are not grunt employees.
So basically a normal day at the office where staff was reduced and the workload was spread among the remaining employee(s).
This is subtly bad and dangerous.
Historically, the relationship between employers and employees is a so-called "Grand Bargain". A number of points in history -- the industrial revolution, the labor union movement, communist revolutions in various countries, etc -- have altered this grand bargain in various ways, but in the current incarnation workers give time and effort to the employer in exchange for money.
We are currently in the middle of such an alteration right now. The old bargain can be simplified to, "be at work from 8:00am to 5:00pm; be focused on work tasks while at work; don't think about work while at home." The Information Age is changing this. Many people want to mesh the two. They want to check Facebook, Twitter, personal e-mail, etc during work hours at their desk. They want the freedom to take a long lunch, leave early, or show up late at the last minute if something comes up. In exchange for this additional leeway during the traditional work day, they monitor and even sometimes respond to work e-mail on their phone at home during off-hours. In many ways, a person's employment is becoming a greater part of their identity.
Now think of this in terms of the Amazon India messaging and their track record of treating their employees. Telling their employees to achieve work-life harmony by ignoring e-mail while off the clock is doubling down on the old bargain, whereby Amazon feels like they get to pretty much OWN YOU during the work day.
This is just one of 100 smart city projects going on in India right now. Yes 100.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=j1zPLR6DPKk
No wonder the world thinks that Americans are morons. Please educate yourself , I know it costs a fortune in your country
"Definitely don't check work email from home, but if your emails for the day aren't answered (because you are 120% utilized) then you'll have to stay until they are."
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
I worked a 32 hour day once.
8 at a client's location in Sydney, 18 travelling (over the dateline), 6 in Sacramento. The accountants wanted to argue.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
Says the guy with a country in massive poverty, practically indentured corruption, sexual inequality, a wealth gap that is shocking with people having bones sticking out of their rotting flesh being passed on the street without a blink because that shits just tuesday there, people crapping all over the place due to lack of basic infrastructure, 64 babies dying due to the hospital not being able to afford oxygen...like the list just never ends.
The americans do not need educating about your shit hole 3rd world country, we already know your trying to get us to swallow a complete load of propeganda bullshit, that place is screwed up and anyone with eyes can see it
Says the guy with a country in massive poverty, practically indentured corruption, sexual inequality, a wealth gap that is shocking with people having bones sticking out of their rotting flesh being passed on the street without a blink because that shits just tuesday there, people crapping all over the place due to lack of basic infrastructure, 64 babies dying due to the hospital not being able to afford oxygen...like the list just never ends.
Wait...are we talking about India of the U.S.?
I don't always use unix-like operating systems; but when I do, I prefer FreeBSD.
Only in certain parts of the USA. America fuck yeah!
Why MAN poo. Does your LGBT community not defaecate?
Of course, the real reason why the US keeps getting worse is that we've shipped all of our wealth generating industry out of the country.
I vote for no emails or phone calls DURING office hours!
This summary is assuming Indians are working too hard. My dealings with Indian contractors (in India) is very inconsistent with that assumption... a lot.
Hey anonymous- if you have the courage identify yourself and do not hide
Coward
RC