At the beginning of this semester, one of my professors said something that stood out to me during class. This professor mentioned Amazon as an example of an efficient company. Initially, I almost found it funny and had it been a one-time comment, I would have probably let it go. However, the example of Amazon being an efficient company kept coming up both during and outside of class hours until I had to speak up. Yes, my professor has a point! Amazon is an efficient company, but at what cost?
According to James Bloodworth, an English journalist and author of Hired: Six Months Undercover In Low-Wage Britain, the working conditions warehouse employees are under requires such speed that, “People just peed in bottles because they lived in fear of being disciplined over ‘idle time’ and losing their jobs just because they needed the loo.”
Amazon is a controversial company for many reasons, but since we’re only focusing on efficiency, the point I want to get to is that you shouldn’t get to the top through inhumane employee treatment. It’s important that the upcoming generation of entrepreneurs acknowledges Amazon’s flaws as a company so that we can create new and better strategies towards a better working environment for future employees.
It’s not just Amazon that over-focuses on efficiency to the extent of overworking the employee. Just the other day, I was at Burger King ordering a meal through the drive through when I witnessed employees being rushed by who I believe was the manager because the workers were taking too long with my order and not improving their time. The apparent manager kept scolding the workers and speaking loudly as they struggled to get me out of the drive through window, constantly forgetting segments of my order. As a consumer, I was a bit uncomfortable with this, not only because I could imagine how stressed out the employee might be, but because I felt as if I wasn’t really treated as a person either. They treated me as a chore to check off their to do list. I would understand this behavior if the place had been full, but there was only one other car behind me in the drive through.
Companies need to realize they’re dealing with humans, not robots, and innovation is what leads to maximizing efficiency. By acknowledging both sides of the spectrum and recognizing that companies like Amazon and Burger King (specifically Amazon) are efficient but at the cost of their worker’s well-being, future entrepreneurs can develop strategies of ethical efficiency where the worker’s well-being is taken into consideration when attempting to be a more efficient company.
A possible solution for this could be focusing on personal employee productivity instead of business efficiency. In their book The One Thing, by Gary Keller with Jay Papasan, it is stated that, “Personal productivity is the building block of all business profit.” They also state how, “In business, profit and productivity are also driven by priority and purpose.” However, before we get into how priority and purpose serve as drivers for profit and productivity, we must first define individual productivity or, simply put, productivity.
Jill Duffy wrote: “Personal productivity is about achieving goals.” Therefore, if employees have a sense of work-related purpose, they can set work-related goals and prioritize the actions necessary to achieve these goals on a day to day basis. This way, they can achieve productivity, which eventually becomes profit.
As you can see, companies like Amazon should get to the top by empowering the people at the “bottom” (warehouse employees for example) because these people build the base structure for the company.
Therefore, to summarize my thoughts:
1. Inhumane treatment is not an efficient strategy to maximize efficiency.
2. Personal productivity driven by purpose could be a possible solution.
3. Ethical innovation is necessary when encountering issues of efficiency and humane treatment.