Hacker News Reader

A normal company would recognize that the employee's hardship is temporary, that treating the employee with compassion will buy long term loyalty that will far outlast the lost-work of the temporary hardship, and would treat the employee with basic human moral emotion and empathy.

I broke my arm in a bad vehicle accident ~5 months into my last work position. I couldn't code for ~2 months. I couldn't commute into the office for another ~2 after that due to personal fragility from the injuries.

My direct boss offered to come help me fix up my apartment in case I couldn't reach things in my apartment. My employer worked with me every step of the way.

I was so touched, having come from a 'fire first' mentality shop before that, that I worked at that firm for another 7 years. I rose to a directorship, and ultimately ran half of their engineering department. I worked countless nights, because I cared. And when I did finally leave, having long since outgrown the organization, I went to work for the boss that had offered to help me rearrange the apartment.

Human empathy is basic, good business sense.

I accept a slightly lower income from my employer, as I think they're pretty generous in their flexibility. Over a decade ago my father died and they just told me to take off whatever I needed. I'm still with them and have seen them to be sympathetic to my colleagues and even when laying them off, have paid over the legal minimum. It's one of the reasons I'm still working for them.

From a distance I know amazon are bastards, but pay more. If I switched job, I'd just accept that some of that salary bump needs to be put into personal insurance.

I'd have sympathy if amazon were knonw to be cuddly and picked on this guy, or didn't pay him enough to...

It varies wildly by manager.

When I was at Amazon, one of my coworkers had a serious mental and physical crisis. Our manager went out of his way to support them, granting them unlimited leave, accepting them back on a part time / temporary basis whenever they felt up for it, etc. To make this work, though, I'm pretty sure the manager and probably his manager went around the system and basically didn't report the absences, because corporate policy almost certainly would've been to fire them. It effectively cost that manager an invaluable headcount spot, and it went on for over a year.

I generally hated working for Amazon, but I loved that particular manager and would happily work for him again anytime.

> I am obviously sympathetic to his plight, but at this point Amazon has that reputation as a brutal employer. Every ex-Amazonian I have known in real life has told me that the pay is so that they own you, whether 3PM or 3AM and they have no qualms about firing you (a former co-worker who was with AWS said that if I ever take an AWS role, don't get a full year lease for a condo in Seattle). Not to blame him, but it is unfortunate that he didn't have someone who could advise him that taking a hard job at a notoriously uncaring company with a sick wife would be unwise.

Make it illegal to companies to do this. Simple. Companies operate within the laws of the society they're based in. If Amazon doesn't like it they can take their bags and go somewhere else.

If many companies are paying $100K/yr, is it really in the public interest to prevent a hard-driving company from paying $300K/yr to employees who want to sign up for that bargain?

If you don’t want that bargain, don’t take it, but I don’t see the public interest in blocking others who do want it from taking it.

Que people bitching that Amazon moved to China and is now a Chinese company. (I don't necessarily believe that'll ever happen but imagine HN if that happened)

You behave like a human being with feelings. You do the best you can to support and help someone who suffers unbelievably and you f**ing show some empathy. This involves actually putting yourself in the shoes of someone else, yes. It means that you share a part of their suffering.

You are dealing with a human, not a "resource" and not a machine. It sickens me to read stories like that to the point where I really consider stopping ordering anything from Amazon.

I hope this practice is going to backfire on them.

If I'm paying a person $200-$300K to build a house and his wife gets cancer; it doesn't entitle him to keep my money. He gives it back because he didn't do his job.

Same principle.

This is actually not about money. It's about a human life.

So why didn't this person simply leave Amazon's shitty job and give some dignity to human life.

Because at the end of the day it is about money.

It's not about "your rights", it's about "what's right". Sure, you're within your rights. But when you're a trillion-dollar-market-cap company, you can eat $300k for a year and let the employee get through his grief and come back to you.

Also, you edited your comment in a way that was deceptive, and didn't say the reason for the edit -- but your comparison is still flawed. $300k to you is pennies to Amazon.

It's not like Jeff Bezos personally fired him. His direct manager is not working with a trillion dollar market cap.

That's another dodge. His direct manager is acting on behalf of the company, and in the interest of the company. The company should have behaved better. His direct manager also isn't paying the writer's salary out of a personal bank account.

The point is that companies ought to treat their employees with empathy even when it costs them. There are reasonable limits to that, yes, but $300k for Amazon is well within that bounds in my view.

No, companies should treat its employees with well defined policies that are easy to understand, enforce and audit.

Treating employees with something as variable and open to interpretation as "empathy" is what causes companies to implode- because who defines empathy? Who defines where the line is drawn? And why is it fair that some people will inevitably get more empathy than others because maybe the manager was having a good day and then a bad day.

Don't take this the wrong way, but I assume you're probably early enough in your career you never had to manage people. But when you eventually do, try to separate idealism from reality.

Sorry, I am old and have more than 10 years of management experience.

You can try to formalize human life with your rules for the next 100k years and it will still not work. There are things that are beyond words and beyond your and my ability to "define".

I am afraid a lot of us have lost any of their inherent common sense, because there was no policy for it.

This is not idealism. This is someone dying. And you are talking about policies. Come on!

Which company imploded because of empathy?

> No, companies should treat its employees with well defined policies that are easy to understand, enforce and audit.

These are not mutually exclusive things, much of the time, but sometimes exceptions have to be made.

> Treating employees with something as variable and open to interpretation as "empathy" is what causes companies to implode- because who defines empathy? Who defines where the line is drawn? And why is it fair that some people will inevitably get more empathy than others because maybe the manager was having a good day and then a bad day.

This is a reasonable point, but it, again, does not address my fundamental point: Amazon as a company should have more ethical and empathetic policies. Amazon as a company should instruct managers to help their employees and be willing to back that help up with financial assistance.

Whether it's Jeff Bezos or this person's manager, you seem to want to keep this at an individual level of decision-making, but that's not the change I want to make.

As for myself, I'm not a manager because I don't want to be, and having to enforce policies I don't agree with is one of the reasons for that.

This is the right answer. Your safety net is your responsibility, not your company’s or the government’s (like it or not, this is the reality we live in today, in the USA). Making the high income that he does, it should have been trivial to save a few years worth of emergency fund for exactly this situation. If he had made different choices he would be able to take a year off and properly take care of his family, not blame Amazon for his life choices.

It shouldn't be the reality in a society with the amount of wealth ours has.

If you make mid six-figures and can’t put together an emergency fund that is on you. He could have made different life choices and spent time with his wife in her last moments rather than slaving away at work.

I agree absolutely on the importance of an emergency fund from a tactical, this is how society is perspective.

But I don't think it should be necessary and I don't concede that that's the right way for things to work.

Do you really think that this is about the money? This man is losing his wife, he cannot think clearly, because he loses the person he loves and has children with. He may suffer from severe depression. I'd bet my right leg that if he didn't need to, he would not think about money for a minute. It also doesn't matter whether he should have built up an emergency fund that can cover cancer treatment expenses. He clearly has different problems than that right now.

I can't comprehend how you can even talk about money until you have helped that guy with all you have. Clearly, Amazon is well enough equipped to first provide support, then ask questions once a situation like that has been resolved.

The way this is being handled is just wrong. You wouldn't treat any of your friends or family members like that, so why do it to your employee?

I take then that we should be paying everyone suffering from anything hundreds of thousand a year. Every homeless person and drug addict?

The analogy of a house is entirely incorrect - a house is a one time transaction. Giving an employee space and support during this time likely leads to loyalty and better production in the long run. It also prevents articles like this, which is probably worth the $300k, as even ONE talented engineer turned off from joining Amazon due to this article will cost them that much and more.

I understand your perspective, but... for how long? 1 month? 6 months? 3 years? 10 years? At what point does basic empathy turn into someone sponging off of generosity?

One of my employees was suffering from lymphatic cancer. So unfortunately, I have real life experience.

You support them for how long it takes. Period.

For my team mate, it took about 18 months until we could slowly start to reintroduce him to normal working hours. Even then, it took a couple of months until he was up to speed again.

As soon as he returned to the office, I treated him as if he was fully recovered to show him that we don't see him as some kind of disabled person, because of his cancer treatment. He recovered quickly and is now back to where he was before he left for treatment performance-wise.

Every screening for remission has been an extreme burden for him. Every time, I told him that even though I can fully understand his fear, the illness doesn't exist for me anymore and he is going to be fine.

2 years later, he's healthy and provides more value to the team than ever. We are all very thankful that he survived.

Fun fact, most people aren't lazy lay-abouts trying to con employers into handouts.

> Not to blame him, but it is unfortunate that he didn't have someone who could advise him that taking a hard job at a notoriously uncaring company with a sick wife would be unwise.

This is blaming him.

> The reality is that you might just need to terminate people who cannot perform, no matter what the reason.

Or even better, give them a few months' leave at half or a quarter salary, or at least let them keep their benefits. I know, crazy to suggest we might put corporate profits over helping someone in need, but you could give it a try.

Edit: Amazon did offer the employee family leave unpaid. It wasn't workable and their response was that he should quit.

I am not blaming him as I don't think he knew. He is not at fault for not knowing. Just that for those who have heard what Amazon is like, that this end result was predictable and it is unfortunate that he didn't have that.

"What did you expect from Amazon" is a fair point, but in no way excuses Amazon whatsoever. They always have the opportunity to be better.

Given that we gladly give 6 months paid maternity to those who choose to have children, I'm fairly sure we'd give this chap a break.

I cannot believe the inhumanity in this thread.

Most of the time on maternity leave is typically unpaid. If I understand correctly, this guy refused to take leave on reduced pay.

Grandparent specifically mentioned paid leave. As far as I know, many companies are now switching to 12-24 week paid leave models for maternity/paternity leave.

Everywhere I've worked in the last 10+ years has paid maternity leave and most now have paid paternity leave. They offered him unpaid leave.

I worked for a small company with very little spare cash and a short runway when an enormous family tragedy struck suddenly. They let me take a month off and accepted I wasn't quite at normal levels of productivity for maybe a year afterwards. It was tough, but they made it work.

If they could afford it, Amazon can.

It’s so fucking simple.

Let them do their work as best as they can under the circumstances. maybe allow them to work less hours / part-time if that’s what they need.

Really, work isn’t all-or-nothing. Like either you do 60h a week or you’re worthless, that’s just a typical American cultural thing to make you a work slave.

A decent company accommodates people who have a spouse with a terminal illness.

It’s that simple. You treat people like fucking human beings.