The 5/15/40/40 vesting schedule is _really_ rough. If given the choice between Amazon and "no-name company," yes, Amazon will do wonders for your resume. But, if comparing an Amazon and Google offer, I'd want a big, big signing bonus from Amazon.
Amazon does a 2 year sign on reward, the first year in bulk the second year in monthly increments. No other company does that, but all we ever hear about is the vesting schedule.
When all is said and done, Amazon pays a little less than Google/Facebook (the caveat here: most Google/Facebook jobs are in California, not Seattle), but with the stock performance we're seeing, they end up making more on average.
The question, is when Amazon's stock stops appreciating so quickly, is other comp going to make up for it?
Never take upward stock performance into account in a comp offer.
If you think Amazon stock is going to go up and you have an offer from another company for more money, just take the offer for more money and buy some Amazon stock. Upward stock potential is never a valid reason to join a publicly traded company.
This is a misunderstanding because it doesn't take into account the asymmetry of the situation: you have more to gain by RSUs going up than you have to lose by them going down.
Imagine my yearly pay will be 150K at Amazon or 200K somewhere else.
Amazon stock could go up, and my pay in my second year could be 250K, in which case I am making more by being at Amazon.
Or it could stay the same or go down, in which case my pay in my second year would be <= 200K, but in that case I can just ditch Amazon for another company to bring my comp back to market levels.
You can buy call options covering the entire vesting amount of RSUs with less than the 50k that would give you the potential upside that you would have as an employee.
Remember, predicting that a stock goes up is just as lucrative for an outsider as it is an insider. Never make a stock prediction part of your evaluation of a job offer because there are plenty of financial instruments to allow you the same upside as an outsider.
You can always tell the people blowing smoke about stock options because they are speaking in the hypothetical instead of the past tense :)
As I used to tell people about why I was selling my options at [some other name brand company] as fast as they vested, choosing to work for the company is an investment. A huge one. And since I was far more likely to be laid off if the stock tanks, owning shares and working there was not diversifying my assets.
It’s the only time I made money on stock options and most of what I earned I earned by... profit taking on shares of a different company that enjoyed two stock splits before our stock started to crater.
Here's past tense: My grants have tripled in value since I started, and as a result my total comp over that period of time has been considerably higher than the offer I received at Google, which was in Mountain View. The higher COL of the Mountain View offer PLUS the outperforming stock put my comp way above what Google would have paid.
When that behavior ends, if Amazon doesn't adjust my comp, I can go to some other tech company, while still having one of the best names you can have on a resume (although, Google would have been arguably better in that case). Furthermore, if we consider my stock gains as part of my annual comp, it gives me a vastly better bargaining position.
Yes, you're not correctly understanding that you depended on a gamble to outperform the Google offer. That same gamble you could have explicitly made in the stock market while taking the Google offer and capturing the upside of the Amazon stock.
Can you explain exactly how to do what you describe? with Amazon's vesting schedule of let's say $200k RSU over 4 years? how much would it actually cost to "invest" like that?
That's not quite accurate. They take it into account for future stock grants. If the stock does well, you won't get more for the given year, but you will still get a raise.
Also, if the stock doesn't perform well, Amazon will grant you more to keep you in the expected band; but it won't take any away if you are making "more than you should".
They won’t take away terms of your existing grant, but they will nerf future annual grants when they see that you’re “already making plenty” with the shares that are yet to vest.
Their sign on bonuses are higher? And who cares, everyone's golden handcuffs are 2 years, so you aren't actually getting it up front anyway. It's pro-rated loan until then.
Amazon has a target compensation for you for your first 4 years, with a cash signing bonus making up for the lack of stock in the first two years, so it evens out.
Of course the 5/15/40/40 model only applies to your signing; all further yearly stock grants are over the next 2 years from grant time.
It's common to get a second vesting in your third year (or else your comp would go down). It's almost common to get a promotion around that time -- managers are responsible for promoting their employees, and it's taken seriously.
It also means your destiny is in your manager's hands, which can be unfair if you end up with a bad manager, or several new ones. And unfortunately at Amazon, this is very common (current employee here).
That's literally every job ever. You aren't going to have a successful career at Google if your manager doesn't want you to. The org golden handcuffs are gone, so if you have a bad manager, change teams.
For the record "bad managers" are no more common or less common at Amazon as any other company.
Maybe inside the SV bubble Amazon is viewed as a career stepping stone or prestigious or whatever? I can't relate but I'm in this weird career niche where open source commits trump or entirely replace resume/cv so I don't claim to be thoroughly knowledgeable about what motivates others. Personally I'd rather deliver pizza than work for a company that exists on the back of a pool of exploited low-wage workers. YMMV.
I've worked in a pizza place and known other people who have worked for pizza places, and none of us described it like a prison or felt the need to piss in a bottle.
No, instead they have a dangerous business model where they force their drivers to get to a location in 30 minutes or less causing them to weave in and out of traffic and crash in hopes of getting a tip. Much better than bottle pissing.
Having a big-name company on your resume helps you get your foot in the door pretty much anywhere else. That's just the way it is.
You can use that to your advantage or not, but you won't be helping any low-wage workers by choosing to work at a small tech company over a famous one -- well, maybe you will if you pass on a job offer from Uber, but for the most part, tech companies pay low-level workers better than non-tech companies.
Amazon employees are literally pissing in bottles because they can't take bathroom breaks without getting fired. Several have been hospitalized or died from heat-related injuries. This isn't merely about pay.
