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Comment by grogenaut | Hacker News Reader

This is literally my job. Amazon calls it Dive Deep/Earn Trust. I get called in constantly to "Remove Blockers". Part of it is just understanding why the policy exists and then getting a policy modification. While it's definitely an art, it's not as hard as a lot of people think, but you can't be afraid to escalate.

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It is also _much_ easier when you're called in for that purpose. Someone who didn't get that mandate on hire will be considered troublesome and overstepping, while someone roped in for that reason will be innovative and an enabler.

I actually grew into this position. And like 60% of the time people don't ask me to show up, I just do. Or someone points me at an issue.

Sounds like some companies got it right, then. I wwould advise figuring out which company one is in before agitating for policy change though.

You sound like a cross between the The Littlest Hobo and The A-Team. :)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Littlest_Hobo

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_A-Team

This sounds like an awesome job. Literally paid to fix frustrating bureacratic processes.

Like a professional user advocate paid to convince developers that the users do have a point and the request is not impossible.

Do you like firefighting and having uncomfortable conversations with people all the time.

Welp, I need more of yous than two pizzas would feed.

Shit, that's like .8 of me.

Is this basically a Business Analyst?

Principal Engineer

I'd rather poke both my eyes out than do that awesome job.

> it's not as hard as a lot of people think

It never is after you've done it once.

It's hard for people to scope an unknown task - especially dealing with bureaucracy. Is it going to be easy peasy, or will the rabbit hole just keep getting deeper.

Additionally, the ROI for an employee to investigate things like this is not very high, or could be negative. Imagine a poor H1B person - whose life and future depends on a company - trying to chase little things like this down. ("it's ok, I don't need " an ssd; an ergonomic chair; a 17" monitor is fine; etc...)

you're doing good work.

It also helps that Amazon isn’t afraid to entertain ideas from lower in the ranks. You just need a strong idea and be willing to write a memo that explains it, then work your way up the chain until you get to a decision maker.

I've seen new hire SDE1's call out jassy in an aws allhands. And jassy seriously answers those questions. Very impressive.