After more than a decade at Amazon, one longtime employee has decided to call it quits and not quietly. In a candid post shared on social media, the former employee reflected on their 12-year journey at the tech giant and what ultimately led them to walk away.
They joined Amazon back in June 2012, a time when the company was still riding high on its Day 1 philosophy, a mantra coined by founder Jeff Bezos to symbolise constant innovation and a startup mindset. By 2016, they had transitioned into a fully remote role. That flexibility, they say, was once a hallmark of Amazon’s forward-thinking culture.
But in recent years, things began to shift. “I saw the writing on the wall,” they wrote. “Decided to leave before being forced back into the office.” The decision came as Amazon doubled down on its return-to-office (RTO) mandate, a move that has sparked pushback from employees across departments. For this veteran, the change was not just logistical, it signaled a deeper cultural shift.
The breaking point was not just RTO. It was the growing pressure from internal systems like stack ranking and performance improvement plans (PIPs), often criticised for fostering fear and competition rather than collaboration. “Watching so many people pushed out due to RTO and the PIP culture completely changed how I view the company,” they said. And then came the closing line, “Amazon is definitely a Day 2 company at this point.”
“I’m making my exit at this point”
The Internet quickly reacted to the post. A user said, ” Joined almost 5 years ago, I’m making my exit at this point too.” Another added, “Same, today was my last day after 6 years. The fact that they are forcing this RTO stuff without even having enough desks and parking for everyone is dumb. They switched the office culture during COVID with the whole agile seating stuff but now aren’t prepared or aren’t willing to go back. ” “I gave Amazon two years as an L6. Left after my sign-on bonus paid out. Amazon isn’t what it used to be under Jeff, that’s for sure,” noted a netizen. “2.5 years in waiting to get fired due to RTO. Just stopped going in. Andy Jassy is a terrible leader,” stated another.
“I left after five years, voluntarily. The team was good but the swirl at executive levels make the work unreasonable. If it looks like we will meet a launch date, they pull the date in, sometimes by just one release, sometimes a whole quarter, and double down on the ask to work more hours. Leaving the rest of us scrambling to find and mitigate new risks. Inevitably an expensive unforeseen issue pops up that might have been mitigated or reasonably addressed given the original deadline, but becomes an insufferable fire when the goal line changes all the time. Reorgs mean we don’t know who our partners are anymore, so fixes are delayed to the original launch schedule. I am not waiting around to get blamed and pipped,” said another user.