Amazon Leadership Principles in Practice (Part 3)
Learn and Be Curious
Working in a technology-related position requires us to continuously update our knowledge and skills—much like installing the latest patches on an operating system. The tech landscape is vast, with countless technologies and learning methods available. The real challenge lies in selecting the right technologies and the most effective ways to learn them.
For those interested in project management and eager to collaborate with a development team, I highly recommend learning Scrum. While Scrum is often associated with software development, its principles can be applied across various projects, including non-tech fields like home improvement, where teamwork is essential.
For non-technical individuals curious about coding, Python is an excellent starting point. Contrary to the perception that coding is complex, it’s fundamentally built around a few basic constructs—if-then-else statements, loops, functions, and other statements—that can be combined to create programs. With a proper online tutorial, you can write your first program in just a few minutes.
Recent graduates interested in high-level programming and rapid prototyping should consider learning C#. This versatile language allows you to develop applications that can run on nearly any platform, including gaming environments.
Experienced coders who have yet to explore Go (Golang) should dive in, especially if you're aiming to work in cloud programming or microservices. Many open-source projects foundational to microservices architecture are built using Go. If you’re already working with microservices and haven’t come across Dapr (which I'm currently learning), it’s worth a quick look to see how it might benefit your projects.
Hire and Develop the Best
In an outsourcing project with a fixed budget, the project owner anticipated a five-member development team. After reviewing the budget and timeline, I proposed that we should instead opt for one or two experienced full-stack developers.
At my own company, I made it a point to hire the best talent available. I participated in the interview process for most, if not all, prospective employees, with a rigorous selection rate of just 1 or 2 candidates out of every 100. In cases where we couldn’t find suitable hires, we would close that branch rather than compromise our standards.
What defines "the best"? They don’t necessarily need prestigious university backgrounds or top scores; instead, they should exhibit potential for growth and excellence. We hired individuals based on this potential and invested in their development. Although this approach was costly, the outcomes spoke for themselves. Our team members came from diverse academic backgrounds—law, medicine, engineering—and we successfully served several Global 500 organizations with a zero project failure rate.
Insist on the Highest Standards
I believe that maintaining high standards begins with oneself. In a previous company, I expressed concerns and reported issues to various product owners, but the responses often included excuses like "not enough resources," "historical reasons," or "political issues."
My motto is straightforward: "Nothing is impossible." For every challenge raised about my teams, products, or projects, I strive to offer solutions.
In a recent project aimed at developing a document e-signature solution, I worked with a team of four developers while serving as the Program Manager, Product Owner, and Scrum Master. Although the initial goal was to match the capabilities of an unknown market competitor, I set our sights higher—to achieve parity with the market leader. The Scrum framework encouraged our team to adopt the mindset that "nothing is impossible." In our first sprint, we delivered functional software showcasing the complete e-signature workflow. Each subsequent sprint enriched our deliverables with unique and creative features. Three months later, I presented our progress to the company founder and management board, who remarked, "I never imagined you all accomplished so much."
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Think Big
There are well-known players in the document e-signature market that likely come to mind. However, how many forms are you currently using from these providers? Consider the HR forms in your organization requiring signatures or the visa application forms from your government. Our team's document e-signature solution enabled users to create or upload documents, easily add form and signature fields, and most importantly, provided a public portal that could be white-labeled, allowing users to host a variety of web forms accessible to anyone within or outside their organization. This solution had the potential to replace any form globally. Think big to better serve your customers.
Bias for Action
In March 2020, before the pandemic hit, I quickly developed a workable prototype for a document collaboration tool, anticipating that most people would soon be working from home and that collaboration tools would become essential. However, the management team insisted on incorporating payment features and establishing business strategies before release.
Eventually, the R&D cloud department head recognized the project's potential and advocated for it to the company management board. After my demo, the founder asked, "Can we release it to the market?" I responded with a confident "yes," only to be interrupted by objections citing the need for extensive market research.
In business, speed is crucial. Many decisions and actions are reversible and don’t require exhaustive study. We value calculated risk-taking.
Frugality
I often hear others evaluate companies or teams based on headcount. However, I can assure you that a team of five experienced full-stack engineers can achieve far more than a team of twenty average developers.
I resonated with the principles outlined in the book The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time, particularly regarding Scrum. By applying effective Scrum practices in my e-signature project, my team of four developers accomplished what another team of sixteen could not.
In my own company, which grew from a single developer to over twenty without external investment, I never sought to impress clients with our headcount. Instead, I emphasized our strength as a small team of top software engineers from the beginning, proudly serving multiple Global 500 clients simultaneously with a flawless project delivery record.
We strive to accomplish more with less. Constraints foster resourcefulness, self-sufficiency, and innovation. There are no bonus points for increased headcount, budget size, or fixed expenses.
Primary References: Amazon Leadership Principles
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