Inside The Mind of a Leader

This is a funny video where Bezos talks about Amazon’s early history and mistakes before moving into Bezos explaining everything he knows. Anyone that is thinking of starting a company should check this out. A MUST WATCH

The “Wow” Factor”: Excellence

As the founder and current CEO of Amazon, Jeff Bezos wants to maintain the success of his company for years to come. Bezos definitely strives for excellence in his company. They have created a successful brand by delivering a customer-obsessed business m odel that has proven itself very successful. He has created a great Amazon strives on constantly growing and adapting so that they can continually be considered as one of the market-leaders in online retail.           

“If you build a great experience, customers tell each other about that. Word of mouth is very powerful.” –Jeff Bezos

The culture of Amazon is one that promotes openness among everyone employed there. Their top management supports this custom and everyone under them follows through with their different ideas of innovation. Through these advances, they patented the one-click ordering technology that allows a customer to use previous payment information with one simple click as a means to making your shopping easier and with less effort. One of the greatest aspects about Amazon is that they are customer-centric.

From reviews to personal recommendations based on your recent viewing history, Amazon is constantly transforming to uphold their platform of excellence in customer service; it’s the main aspect that keeps Amazon such a notable brand. I doubt that many people in the modern world don’t know the Amazon name and it’s because of their commitment to the customers. Amazon is so profitable because they fully understand that in retail, it’s all about the wants and needs of the consumer and if they aren’t happy,  since this sort of obsession translates into a positive reputation to gain customers and therefore, higher revenues and long term profits. They stay ahead of the competition by exploiting their technology to make using Amazon.com an enjoyable experience for current and future shoppers.

Who Cares About Ego?

No company can survive without its leadership keeping their egos in check. The ego needs to take a backseat in management meaning that the requirements of the organization come before the whims of the management. But this also involves coming together and acting as a community to help develop their leadership style and brand. Above all, one must be fully committed to always doing the right thing no matter what. Overall, ego is upholding everything and then some of what the company believes in.

Amazon is an interesting subject in terms of ego. As the number 1 online retailer, I think they deserve to have a little bit of a big ego but, from the outside looking in, that doesn’t seem to be the case. Amazon’s first and foremost priority is making their customers happy so that they, in turn, spread their love of Amazon. The only greed that they possess is striving to increase their consumer support.

In particular, Bezos has come under scrutiny for creating a new aerospace company called Blue Origin specializing in space tourism. Many critics judged Bezos as being man with a boy-like consuming fascination with rockets and with his immense wealth, he was able to make his childhood fantasies a reality. So… I’m going to be honest. I don’t give a damn and neither should these detractors. First off, they’re doing this because haters are going to hate and that is the reality of the situation. Hell, wouldn’t you like to have a net worth of 18 BILLION?!?! My sentiments exactly…  Also, whatever the man wants to do with his money is between him and his wife; in the big picture, Blue Origin is separate from Amazon. So what’s the big friggin’ deal??

Many people say that Jeff Bezos is only doing this because his ego is so large that he feels invincible and that he can do anything. I don’t think that’s the case. He saw an opportunity to make a dream into a reality and he took it. There’s nothing wrong with that. If his venture fails, yes it will suck but you learn from your experiences and that situation would be no different. Besides, he’s got a hell of a lot of money to fall back on. Your failures and achievements are what allow you to require personal leaning and change that translates into maintaining a healthy ego.

Overall, a down to earth ego dictates how you manage something or somebody. It deals with how you have influenced others and Amazon has done a damn good job at influencing. There isn’t much on Amazon that you can’t buy from them and that is amazing. With the leadership of Jeff Bezos, they have had precedence in the their industry as well as, game changing innovations like the one-click system and their extensive services for customers are hard to compare to another site.

So in the big picture, if Jeff Bezos has a little bit of an ego, I think he deserves it. He’s worked hard for everything that he has achieved without making his company fall in the name of possessing a slight ego. No matter what, Bezos is still one of the best leaders in modern society and no one can take that away from him as long as he sustains what is right.

This is Jeff Bezos’ 2007 Ted Talk where he compares the Dot com bubble to the American gold rush. Though he ultimately decides the analogy can not be sustained and settles on a comparison between the internet and the electrical lightbulb.

Jeff Bezos, founder and current CEO of Amazon, has established himself as one of the most successful entrepreneurs in the world over the last decade. Initially, Bezos examined businesses that were traditionally all mail order and tried to figure out which one could be done over the Internet. As soon as he chose the book business, he got on a plane the next day and attended a convention in Los Angeles to learn everything he could about books, immediately demonstrating his engagement in the project. Althoughsomewhat nervous about risking his secure position in New York, he decided that the risk would be worth it. Bezos moved to Seattle and set up his site which by day 30, had sold books in all 50 states and 45 countries around the world. Bezos continued to expand his business using his six core values: customer obsession, ownership, bias for action, frugality, high hiring bar and innovation. He said that their, “vision is the world’s most customer-centric company. The place where people come to find and discover anything they might want to buy online” (Academy of Achievement). Even today, Bezos continues to be innovative with his development of the Kindle, an electronic reading device.

Through his ability to think outside of the box and take unparallel risks, Bezos has established his edge. He has come across many tough decisions as a leader, and has been forced to pursue excellence in the face of adversity. Furthermore, Bezos has been willing to stand firm with his beliefs, even when pressure from investors attempted to stray him and his team in another strategic direction. In addition, through his success, he has influenced the people around him and enabled them to believe in what he is creating. He has shown his employees and customers that he is aware of his risk-taking, but believes in it enough to continue. Furthermore, he has fully engaged his employees. He has spent time with lower level employees in the Kentucky warehouses to discover and understand what they do everyday to make his company a success. Bezos actively listens and communicates his strategy in simple, effective ways. Moreover, he understands and is fully engaged in his own business, which influences others to be interested as well. Bezos says that “you don’t choose your passions, your passions choose you” (Inc.). Through meetings and talks, he has successfully conveyed this to all of his employees and gotten them all fully invested in their work. As a leader, Bezos clearly has many ideal qualities that have led him to create such a lucrative company as Amazon.

Who is Jeff Bezos? Well, he is one of the top ten CEO according to the Harvard Business Review and as the creator of Amazon, Bezos is considered one of greatest innovators of the current world. How does a person become so successful?! Yes he did go to Princeton University where he got a degree in computer science and electrical engineering, and he became a senior VP of D.E. Shaw, a company that specialized in the use of computer science in financial markets, at a young age. But this fella wasn’t always a billionaire or as successful as he is now.

There are many traits that Bezos has that allow him to be successful as an executive and as a leader, but since the internet boom in the 1990′s, he has primarily shown vision. A willingness to try to change ‘the game’ and create a new future. As the internet began to grow and be used by the public. Bezos lost absolutely no time and began to look for ways to revolutionize the mail-order business using the Internet’s vast amount of virtual space and ability to connect anywhere in the world. His work led him to create Amazon, and from his two bedroom house in Seattle he launched what is now one of the biggest web companies in the world.

Amazon began by selling books. Other mail order companies could not send the catalog for all of their books in the mail due the size and weight, and cost. However, Bezos used the internet to store all the information of the books available for sale through Amazon in the Internet’s vast database, and shared it with everyone who accessed the website. Soon, Amazon began to grow and in no time it became a leader in the market for books. Shareholders began to look for ways to increase the revenue that Amazon was bringing, but Bezos ignored them and began to spread the company further into the market. The shareholders thought that this was dangerous, since the the cost of keeping Amazon running was beginning to be too much. Time passed however, and Amazon did not crumble like many of it’s competitors. Bezos began upgrading the website to include many unheard-of, yet very efficient, features to the website, such as one-click shopping. That was not all, Bezos also began to include customer reviews and making them available to the public, and verified purchases customers made through email verification. The changes to Amazon did not stop there. In 2002, Amazon began to sale clothing articles trough partnerships with clothing retailers such as GAP. It wasn’t too late after that when Amazon began to sale electronics as well.

Today Amazon is a very successful and key player in the market for goods bought online. Yes, I know that there are many things that could’ve made an impact in the growth of the company, but I believe that the vision that Bezos showed from the very start is what brought him to the top; to be known as one of the best and most successful CEO’s in the world, and a true leader.

Anyone can come up with a good idea that could revolutionize how humans act in their daily lives but few have the idea and the knowledge to put such a plan into action. Jeff Bezos attended Princeton University and graduated with degrees in electrical engineering and computer science. The strong Wall Street alumni network of Princeton led Bezos to work for Fitel which designed and installed an international trade network for brokers to communicate in real time and obtain information faster and more efficiently. Following this work experience Bezos moved on to D.E. Shaw and was tasked with “examining the potential of the internet” (Biography.com). These experiences along with Bezos’s personal creativity, which stemmed from high school when he created Dream Institute that aimed to force young high school students to think creatively to create and solve problems, shaped the expertise and drive he would need to successfully found and launch Amazon.

The degree in computer science and electrical engineering was essential to the foundation of Amazon for it is an e-commerce business that requires extensive amounts of code. It is reported that the several warehouses Amazon runs require just as much code to operate, due to the automation, as Amazon’s website (money.cnn.com). The expertise accompanied by the information on how networks work and operate from Bezos on the job training helped Bezos create the interconnected network of retailers and 3rd party sellers Amazon now works with. Additionally, at D.E. Shaw Bezos got a taste of leadership and management for he reached the position of Senior Vice President in a little over a year. Though the greatest benefit from working at D.E. Shaw was that Bezos gained an education in the internet and this expertise allowed him to see the potential for an online retailer. Bezos was able to expertly force his employees to hink creatively which has produced such inventions as online shopping for one but also the innovations of the shopping cart icon, one-touch ordering and even email notifications following a successful purchase. To run and mold Amazon into the well oiled company that it is now takes lots of expertise in the field of e-commerce. I believe Bezos never planned out of college to gain the expertise to start a company such as Amazon he simply was just a creative working man that luckily gained the needed expertise and was fortunate to be in the correct position with such knowledge at a time when the Internet was about to take off with the general public. Additionally though, it is hard to judge Bezos expertise for he is the founder of Amazon and the only CEO to ever run the company. He has created it all and such there is no predecessor to judge him against. With that being said I feel all you have to do is look at the current yearly P/L report of Amazon and it would seem Jeff Bezos has done a pretty good job with the expertise that he has.

The culture and work environment inside Amazon is a unique place. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos has often been characterized as a goofy and laughable character. This personality is said to be carried over to the Amazon work environment. Though many former employees claim that this happy attitude does not get work accomplished at Amazon, claiming people wear happy faces but they work their butt off to accomplish the company goals. Weekly management meetings are claimed to be, ”four-hour marathons that resemble oral doctorate exams. Executives make presentations about new products, technologies, pricing strategies, or cost-control measures, and Bezos, with the skill of a first-class prosecutor, asks questions until he is satisfied he has explored every angle”(money.cnn.com). This investigation into every angle shows that Jeff Bezos has the expertise to ask the right questions but this prosecution also sets rigorous work schedule for Amazon executives. These examinations are based on qualitative questions. Bezos is said to require every possible piece of data possible pertaining to the problem being questioned and only then will Bezos make a decision. Bezos’s decision is the other essential aspect to Amazon culture, it is always Bezos’s way or no way at all. This attribute of the culture and of Jeff Bezos in particular limits what top executives can do. One former Amazon executive put it this way,”At the end of the day there is a sole-proprietorship aspect to the business”(money.cnn.com). Though Bezos does highly encourage his employees to think creatively. This mindset comes from Bezos younger years in high school with his Dream Institute and is exemplified at Amazon with the Just Do It award. The award is given to employees who do positive things for Amazon without asking their direct report. Additionally, Bezos pushes his innovation priorities with monthly lectures from scientists with the goal to spark ideas in Amazon employees that could lead new and revolutionary things. Though as much as creativity is a major factor at Amazon the decision whether to pursue major creative ideas always ends on Bezos’s desk. The last aspect of Amazon culture that permeates from Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is his top to bottom interest in the company. At time Bezos will micromanage a project so that it is done to his exact specifications claiming, “I’ve not seen an effective manager or leader who can’t spend some fraction of time down in the trenches”(money.cnn.com). To prove this point Bezos spends a week each year during the fourth quarter at each of Amazon’s 6 warehouses checking on things and looking for ways to improve the business and produce more profit. In conclusion, the environment of Amazon is dominated by Jeff Bezos, but in my opinion, rightly so. Jeff Bezos founded and created Amazon and has turned it into a billion dollar company. His precedents of creativity and hard work run throughout the company but it is clear that Jeff Bezos is the dominant personality and the decision maker.

I think at some point in the near future Jeff Bezos is going to seriously have to look at the way he runs Amazon and the environment that he has set in place at Amazon. I think the creativity part of Amazon is fantastic and he should continue to promote an atmosphere that encourages employees to rebuild the “box.” Where Bezos and Amazon culture will fail in the future is it’s utter reliance on Jeff Bezos. Bezos has done a fantastic job building Amazon but he needs to begin to promote a more trusting environment where top executives can grow and continue to progress in the company. That doesn’t mean to pay employees more money or for Bezos to relinquish the CEO position but for these top executives to be able to make decisions apart from Jeff Bezos. Bezos will not live forever but for Amazon to continue to grow he must begin to allow other employees to make meaningful decisions.

This blog is set up to be a forum to learn about the strengths and weaknesses of major companies and the leaders that run them. Bringing together the vast leadership styles and analyzing them against the back drop of the 11 Es we can begin to learn what may work for us as leaders. We invite everyone to comment and share their own opinions about the posts on the blog and also to become an author as well.

Please contact Jesus Tueme to get involved. jesus.tueme@duke.edu