Amazon Layoffs: Amazon is reportedly planning to reduce 14,000 managerial positions by early next year in a bid to save $3 billion annually, according to a Morgan Stanley report. This initiative is part of CEO Andy Jassy’s strategy to boost operational efficiency by increasing the ratio of individual contributors to managers by at least 15 per cent by March 2025.
A lot of us here work in software. Often times there are two tracks, IC and people management. Often times both of those tracks pay similarly.
The good people managers and directors are usually folk that were identified as being good at mentoring people and good at providing air cover so people could do good work.
I’m sorry you’ve never worked at a place with good middle management. It does exist in many places, and many people selected it because they like working with the people and the strategy more than the product directly. Often times these people could’ve been paid comparably by working as a staff or principal track engineer or experience designer.
The people managers are identified as the ones that can control and discipline the workforce to maximize their exploitation.
Whether they’re nice about it or they just really like their job as a slave driver doesn’t really change what their job is. Their job is to be the enforcers for upper management and this grants them a different class position.