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by
Colin Bryar
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May 29 - July 25, 2021
This shorter process is called OP2, and it generates the plan of record for the calendar year.
OP2
OP2 makes it crystal clear what each group has committed to do, how they intend to achieve those goals, and what resources they need to get the work done.
OP2 goal
After reviewing our plan with us, the S-Team might have chosen six of
the 23 to become S-Team goals. The music team would still have worked to achieve all 23 goals, but it would be sure to make resource allocation decisions throughout the year to prioritize the six S-Team goals ahead of the remaining 17.
Three notably Amazonian features of S-Team goals are their unusually large number, their level of detail, and their aggressiveness.
features of s team goals
S-Team goals are mainly input-focused metrics that measure the specific activities teams need to perform during the year that, if achieved, will yield the desired business results.
S-Team goals are aggressive enough that Amazon only expects about three-quarters of them to be fully achieved during
the year. Hitting every one of them would be a clear sign that the bar had been set too low.
Reviews are conducted in multihour S-Team meetings scheduled on a rolling basis over the quarter rather than all at once.
At many companies, when the senior leadership meets, they tend to focus more on big-picture, high-level strategy issues than on execution. At Amazon, it’s the opposite. Amazon leaders toil over the execution details and regularly embody the Dive Deep leadership principle, which states: “Leaders operate at all levels, stay connected to the details, audit frequently, and are skeptical when metrics and anecdotes differ. No task is beneath them.”
Green means you are on track, yellow means there is some risk of missing the goal, and red means you are not likely to hit the goal unless something meaningful changes.
Status color theme
Amazon believes that the “performance” in performance-based compensation must refer to the company’s overall performance, that is, the best interests of shareholders, which in turn are perfectly aligned with the best interests of customers.
The wrong kind of compensation practice can cause misalignment in two ways: (1) by rewarding short-term goals at the expense of long-term value creation, and (2) by rewarding the achievement of localized departmental milestones whether or not they benefit the company as a whole. Both can powerfully drive behaviors that are antithetical to the company’s ultimate goals.
One clear downside to this approach is that other companies with deep pockets can try to hire away your best employees with big cash offers. It’s true, some employees leave for a short-term jump in their cash compensation. But on the positive side, Amazon’s approach reinforces the kind of culture it seeks to develop. Sometimes it is okay to lose people who have a short-term focus while retaining those who are in it for the long term.
“We want missionaries, not mercenaries.”
We have all encountered mercenaries in our career. They are in it to make a fast buck for themselves, they don’t have the organization’s best interests at heart, and they don’t have the resolve to stick with your company through challenging times.
confirmation bias—the tendency for people to focus on the positive elements that others identify and ignore the negatives and contradictory signals.
The Effects of Personal Bias and Hiring Urgency
According to Sequoia Capital, the average startup in Silicon Valley spends 990 hours to hire 12 software engineers!1 That’s more than 80 hours per hire, and all that time taken away from a team that’s already understaffed and working on deadline only adds to the urgency to staff up.
Brent Gleeson, a leadership coach and Navy SEAL combat veteran, writes, “Organizational culture comes about in one of two ways. It’s either decisively defined, nurtured and protected from the inception of the organization; or—more typically—it comes about haphazardly as a collective sum of the beliefs, experiences and behaviors of those on the team. Either way, you will have a culture. For better or worse.”
Hiring at Amazon Before the Bar Raiser
The Amazon Bar Raiser program has the goal of creating a scalable, repeatable, formal process for consistently making appropriate and successful hiring decisions.
Amazon’s Bar Raiser process was designed to provide that framework, minimize the variability of ad hoc hiring processes, and improve results.
The Bar Raiser could not be the hiring manager or a recruiter. The Bar Raiser was granted the extraordinary power to veto any hire and override the hiring manager.
The concept of a Bar Raiser with veto power was seen by shortsighted managers as an enemy standing in the way of their progress.
There is no substitute for working long, hard, and smart at Amazon.
There are eight steps in the Bar Raiser hiring process: Job Description Résumé Review Phone Screen In-House Interview Written Feedback Debrief/Hiring Meeting Reference Check Offer Through Onboarding
8 steps of bar raisers hiring process
Job Description
At Amazon, it is the hiring manager’s responsibility to write the description, which the Bar Raiser can review for clarity.
Résumé Review
Phone Screen
Roughly 45 minutes of that hour should consist of the manager questioning the candidate and following up where necessary.
the final 15 minutes of the call are reserved for the candidate to ask questions.
In-House Interview Loop
The in-house interview loop takes five to seven hours to complete and requires the participation of several people who undoubtedly have many other responsibilities and tasks on their plate, so this step must be carefully planned, prepared, and executed.
Typically, the most effective loops consist of five to seven interviewers.
There are a few important qualifications for the loop participants.
First, everyone must have been properly trained in the company’s interviewing process.
Second, no loop participant should be more than one level below the level of the position the candidate will hold.
There are two distinctive features in an Amazon in-house interview loop: behavioral interviewing and Bar Raiser.
1. Behavioral Interviewing
The method that Amazon interviewers use for drilling down goes by the acronym STAR (Situation, Task, Action, Result): “What was the situation?” “What were you tasked with?” “What actions did you take?” “What was the result?”
2. The Bar Raiser
Written Feedback
The written feedback includes the interviewer’s vote on the candidate. There are only four options—strongly inclined to hire, inclined to hire, not inclined to hire, or strongly not inclined to hire.
Debrief/Hiring Meeting
The Bar Raiser leads the meeting,
no more than a few days after the interviews have been completed.
The meeting is concluded with a decision from the hiring manager (validated by the Bar Raiser) to hire or not hire.
The Amazon debrief meeting is an opportunity for each interviewer to learn from others and to develop their ability to assess talent.
