If I wanted to create a meaningful company one day, I needed to learn how big companies operated. What worked well? What should I emulate with my next startup? What stopped working when companies got big? What pitfalls should I avoid? I needed to learn how business worked, how to manage, lead, and scale a fast-growing organization. At startups, you just ran as fast as you could, but how did real companies work? I wanted to find out. It also wouldn’t hurt to get a paycheck and recharge the coffers. In the fall of 2004, I took an offer from Amazon Web Services (AWS) and moved to Seattle.
