Amazon Culture Blasted, Bezos Responds

(RTTNews) - Online retail giant Amazon.com, Inc. has been slammed in an article in the New York Times over the weekend regarding the treatment meted out to its employees, with the article describing Amazon as a "bruising workplace."

Amazon, which recently became the most valuable retailer in the country, is charged in the NYT article of "conducting an experiment in how far it can push white-collar workers to get them to achieve its ever-expanding ambitions."

Responding to the article that depicts an exceedingly harsh environment for employees at Amazon, Founder and Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos dismissed the scathing criticism and said in a memo to employees that the NYT article "doesn't describe the Amazon I know or the caring Amazonians I work with every day."

The article stated that employees at Amazon were routinely mistreated and pitted against each another's ideas at meetings, all while working long hours.

Bezos said the NYT article prominently features anecdotes describing "shockingly callous management practices," including people being treated without empathy while enduring family tragedies and serious health problems.

In his memo, he wrote "Even if it's rare or isolated, our tolerance for any such lack of empathy needs to be zero."

He also urged employees to contact him directly or escalate to HR, if they knew of "stories like those reported" in the article by the NYT.

He said he strongly believes that "anyone working in a company that really is like the one described in the NYT would be crazy to stay. I know I would leave such a company."

Bezos ended the memo by saying, "But hopefully, you don't recognize the company described. Hopefully, you're having fun working with a bunch of brilliant teammates, helping invent the future, and laughing along the way."