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Jeff Bezos once said he tells Amazon employees to ‘wake up every morning terrified’

Jeff Bezos once said he tells Amazon employees to ‘wake up every morning terrified’

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Amazon founder Jeff Bezos once said he tells employees to “wake up terrified every morning” to better serve customers.

Classification:

Rating: correct attributionRating: correct attribution

Rating: correct attribution

Context:

The comment comes from a letter to Amazon shareholders in 1999, discussing the company’s philosophical approach to its customer relationships and the importance of employee productivity.

It claims Amazon founder and billionaire Jeff Bezos once said he tells his employees to “wake up terrified every morning” they circulate online by the end of 2024.

A video shared on tiktok (filed) presented a extract from an interview with Martha Becka “described, self-described, best-selling author” coach and speaker”, from an episode of the podcast “The diary of a CEO.” In the clip, Beck said:

I was surprised to discover that Jeff Bezos, one of the richest men in the world, says in his quarterly reports and he loves to say, in many settings, that he tells all the thousands of Amazon employees who work under him… He wants that everyone wakes up terrified every morning. And that’s the word she uses: terrified. And to stay terrified all day, because that makes them productive. But most of these people are becoming by financially. He wants them to be afraid all the time so that he and the shareholders you can get more things. And they already have a lot of things!

The Tiktok user who shared the clip added a caption that read: “No one deserves this, they are worth so much and don’t need to live in fear.” As of this writing, this specific Tiktok has been shared almost 10,000 times. Other users weighed in on the claim on social media platforms, including instagram (filed), unknown (filed) and Rags (filed).

In fact, Bezos once said that he tells employees to “wake up terrified every morning,” but the available evidence suggests a different context than Beck’s. intimate.

In an interview with CNET from 1999, available to view YouTubeInterviewer Wendy Walsh asked Bezos around the 1 minute and sixteen second mark: “I heard you once say that you told your staff members to be afraid of your customers. What does that mean?”

Bezos’ response is:

Well I ask everyone around here to wake up terrified tomorrow through sweat-soaked leaves. But to be very precise about what they fear. And they should not be afraid of our competitors. They must be afraid of our customers. Because those are the people we have a relationship with. Those are the people who send us money. And I believe our customers are loyal to us until such time as someone else offers them better service.

Additionally, it appears on CNET Interview that Bezos was being paraphrased from a 1999 letter to Amazon shareholders recapitulation he previous year, which was later published in the 2020 book, “Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos” by Bezos and Walter Isaacson.

The relevant section appears on page 102 of the book under a heading that says “our clients”:

But there is no rest for the weary. I constantly remind our employees to be afraid, to wake up every morning terrified. Not from our competition, but from our clients. Our customers have made our business what it is, they are the ones with whom we have a relationship, and they are the ones to whom we owe a great obligation. And we consider them to be loyal to us, until such time as someone else offers them better service.

(“Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos” by Walter Isaacson and Jeff Bezos)

Although Bezos’ statements at the time appeared to be an exaggerated commitment to the Amazon customer, the revelations about the company working conditions In the decades since they were probably responsible for the online reaction to this comment since it resurfaced.

Snopes recently investigated claims that Amazon initially denied permission to an employee injured in the attack in New Orleans on January 1, 2025, in addition to previous claims of workers urinating in water bottles Due to strict time demands and claims that Amazon workers earn so little they qualify for food stamps.

Sources:

– YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxn0kav9vno. Accessed January 21, 2025.

—. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fajtqschfve. Accessed January 21, 2025.

Berger, Chloe. “Jeff Bezos revealed his secret to Amazon’s success 25 years ago: ‘I told everyone around here to wake up terrified every morning, their sheets soaked in sweat.'” Fortune, https://fortune.com/2024/05/15/jeff-bezos-revealed-secret-denched-terrified-sweat/. Accessed January 21, 2025.

Bezos, Jeffrey. Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos, with an Introduction by Walter Isaacson. Harvard Business Review Press, 2020.

“Senate report alleges Amazon rejected warehouse safety recommendations due to productivity concerns.” AP News, December 16, 2024, https://apnews.com/article/amazon-warehouse-worker-injuries-senate-commitee-eb5b72dd501be0bcce9d919c34731290.

Umoh, Ruth. “Why Jeff Bezos wants Amazon employees to ‘wake up every morning terrified'”. CNBC, August 28, 2018,

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