Amazon Has A Brutal System For Employees Trying To Get Promoted

Here's the way it works.

To get ahead at Amazon, your boss has to debate why you deserve a promotion with other managers from the company. If he or she makes an effective case on your behalf, then you get the nod. If not, you wait another 12 months.

These debates take place at two different meetings during the year.

In the first meeting of the year, usually in February or March, the senior staff talks about employees to see who's doing well, and who isn't. According to a leaked presentation of how the system works, this meeting is basically a primer for the second meeting.

In the second meeting, which takes place in September or October, the leaders finalize who's getting a promotion, and talk about who is doing well and who is doing poorly.

This system, which was created by Jeff Bezos, is supposed to cut down on politics and in-fighting. Unfortunately, Stone says it has the opposite effect.

"Ambitious employees tend to spend months having lunch and coffee with their boss's peers to ensure a positive outcome once the topic of their proposed promotion is raised in [the meetings]," says Stone.

Stone also notes that promotions are very limited at Amazon, so if you fight for your employee to get a promotion, it means someone else's employee gets snubbed. And anyone in the room can nuke someone else's promotion.