We're quickly approaching the holiday season and with that comes a massive uptick in e-commerce activity, from Black Friday and Cyber Monday madness, to the ensuing logistical chaos that will inevitably lead to long hours at dozens of Amazon ($AMZN) fulfillment facilities, engineering hubs, and marketing conference rooms.
Amazon, at least outside of its warehouses, has historically scored relatively well when it comes to workplace reviews, with a generous compensation and benefits package. But something happened over the summer at Bezos' e-commerce giant: workplace reviews began to tumble across several key metrics.
Across nearly 40,000 individual reviews posted to Indeed, when it came to how employees feel about Amazon's Senior Management, their world-life balance, the company's culture and values, and their compensation and benefits, overall sentiment began to tumble in June 2019.
Beginning in the first week of June, Senior Management rating began to dive, moving from a cumulative average of 3.035 to 2.99 as of this week.
Work-life balance ratings fell on that same date from 3.14 to 3.11 as of this week.
Respondents on Indeed rated Amazon's Culture and Values a 3.23 on June 6. As of this week, however, that metric's cumulative average has fallen to 3.19.
Compensation and benefits — historically a metric that's been good to Amazon — moved from 3.51 on June 6 to 3.48 by October 19.
These tumbling reviews began at a time when Amazon was unveiling drone technology for deliveries, potentially triggered staff. It also came when the company was coming under scrutiny from the Federal Trade Commission. On top of that, early June was when Amazon announced it would be shuttering Amazon Restaurants, its short-lived food delivery service. These things combined to run Amazon stock prices lower than usual.
The notable June 2019 drop-in ratings coincides with a notable slump in stock performance, when shares saw a low of $1,690 per share, leading one to suggest that employee sentiment, at least at public companies, can reflect that company's stock performance, especially at a company like Amazon in which stock can be used as a workplace incentive.
About the Data:
Thinknum tracks companies using information they post online - jobs, social and web traffic, product sales and app ratings - and creates data sets that measure factors like hiring, revenue and foot traffic. Data sets may not be fully comprehensive (they only account for what is available on the web), but they can be used to gauge performance factors like staffing and sales.
Further Reading:
- Hiring for drone teams soars at Amazon, Google, and Uber
- GM senior management's approval rating has been sinking all year
- Despite reports to the contrary, hiring at Amazon is down 22%