How To Scale A Giant

Amazon wants you. And you. And you.

"Amazon now has a global full- and part-time workforce of 647,000, which is 50% more people than Alphabet, Apple, Facebook, and Microsoft combined."

The Seattle-based company currently has 28,000 job openings. It adds 330+ employees per day. But how does it successfully scale a company with nearly 650,000 people?

Amazon relies on Beth Galetti, its HR Chief and one of only 18 people who report directly to Jeff Bezos. In typical Amazon fashion, Galetti -- a former engineer -- wants to streamline the HR process.

Automating at Amazon is unsurprising, but how she describes their approach is critical:

“We don’t develop tools. We don’t develop systems. We develop products.”

Businesses use tools and systems internally, but they develop products for customers.

You see, to Amazon HR, current and future employees are not teammates. They are customers.

It's a radical idea, and the implications -- feedback, accountability, service -- are enormous. Imagine if your boss treated you as a customer.

Since its founding, in 1995, Amazon's mission has been "to be Earth's most customer-centric company."

If they offer new hires free Prime, I'm in.