Q&A with Simanti Olive, Sr Software Development Engineer Last Mile Delivery Tech

Tell us a little about yourself?

I joined Amazon almost 9 years ago as Software Development Engineer (SDE 2) in the Fire tablet team for Lab 126. I have worked on many different teams since then: Fire Tablet, Fire TV, Alexa and finally the Last Mile Delivery Assistant Technology team where I have been for the past 3 years as Sr. Software Development Engineer (SDE3).

What is your favorite Amazon memory?

Over the past 9 years, I have collected many wonderful memories with multiple teams. My favorite memory so far has always been the first day I walked into Lab 126 office in Sunnyvale for an interview. As expected, I was a bit nervous and the interview was supposed to be 5 hours long with a break for lunch. Fifteen minutes into my first round, I realized this was actually fun! We were having a discussion about what problems I faced at work, how I solved them and why I took the particular approach that I chose. All the remaining rounds of interviews followed the same pattern. At the end of the day, I felt that regardless of whether or not I get the job, I enjoyed interviewing here and meeting everyone. The team members were knowledgeable and put me at ease and that helped me stay alert and perform well.

This experience made me realize that I was really looking forward to working with the team. This experience also motivated me to become a Bar Raiser at Amazon and help ensure that future candidates have a great experience interviewing with us.

What accomplishment at Amazon are you most proud of?

There is so many things to be proud of when working at Amazon, I have worked on delivering multiple products such as Fire TV and features such as providing captioning on Alexa devices to help people with hearing disabilities. I’m most proud of my latest contribution to Last Mile team to deliver the first Amazon Electric Delivery Van (EDV) in collaboration with Rivian whom we worked closely with to design, implement and deliver these vans at record pace. This effort has a large impact on Amazon’s climate pledge agreement. My contribution was specifically to the software that runs on the head unit of the van and provides a much-improved delivery experience for our drivers. We now have thousands of Rivian EDV delivering Amazon products in US. Our next step is to accomplish the same in EU. Last year we ran a pilot program in Germany and now we’re getting ramped up to launch these Rivian EDV vehicles in Munich, Berlin and Dusseldorf. Click here to read the full article.

What brings you passion/excitement to your role and team?

I have had the amazing opportunity to work with multiple teams across Amazon, and as an engineer I’m passionate about solving hard problems for our customers and how these solutions impact them in the real world. In my current team our customers are our drivers, and finding innovative solutions to help improve their day-to-day experience is always exciting to me. For example, I worked on the integration of the Amazon delivery experience into the Rivian head unit so that drivers do not need to use their mobile phones while driving. This solution provides a dual screen experience inside the Rivian vehicle and displays critical information related to navigation, safety and itinerary by integrating with mobile app as well as the vehicle signals. This software has access to the vehicle status, which is not available in the phone. The vehicle signals combined with location data enable us to eliminate many touches on the screen for a safer driving experience.

We’re currently looking into more technologies that we can build and experiment with. In addition to the exciting solutions we implement, I am also motivated by a team culture that supports innovation and the concept of “2-way doors,” both of which enable us to move fast on our ideas.

What is your favorite leadership principle and why?

This is a hard one to answer since all the Leadership principles, such as Dive Deep, Bias for Action, and Invent and Simplify are all pieces of what makes an engineer. That being said, the principle that I feel provides a foundation for the others is Customer Obsession.

Customer obsession drives my key decisions and innovations. Many exciting initiatives in Amazon started with our customer always in mind, what customers need and what will improve their experience. We then work backwards from that principle. For example, our motivation for integrating with Rivian EDV came from our drivers as our customers. Previously, drivers were using a mobile phone with our Mobile Delivery Application for navigation while driving. With limited screen real estate, they could not see info aside from the critical navigation and safety information. Drivers also needed to tap multiple times on the phone after they parked to view the itinerary information and to continue the delivery. We wanted to improve this experience and came up with the concept of the In-vehicle Delivery App in Rivian EDV. We did multiple iterations of this concept and then built prototypes. At each phase we collected feedback from our drivers and made adjustments.

Even after releasing the vehicles, we continued and will continue to gather feedback from our drivers to make improvements to the software and add new features that will provide an overall safer and more efficient delivery experience for our drivers.

What do you do for fun/work life balance?

I have a family of six, which includes two boys and two dogs. We love the outdoors and I'm fortunate to live in the Greater Bay Area where I have access to beautiful beaches and trails within minutes. Going on hikes with my family on weekends and walks with my dogs on weekdays help rejuvenate me. One of my favorite hikes is at Henry Cowell State park that takes me to an observation point where I can see the entire Monterey Bay.

During vacation, I’ve been visiting different national parks. Last summer I went to Bryce Canyon National Park and Zion National Park in Utah. This summer I went to Yellowstone National Park in Montana and Wyoming. During the winter, I enjoy going snowboarding with my family in the Sierras. My favorite place for snowboarding lately has been to a small resort called Dodge Ridge near Yosemite, since it’s family friendly and great for the kids!