Staff loyalty, engagement and empowerment: Key takeaways from Amazon’s 10k offer to employees

Jeff Bezos has done it again! He has once again set the bar incredibly high for all leaders and executives alike. In case you missed it or are looking for insights on the topic at hand, this week we are looking at how enticing your employees could be the best thing for your company when done the right way!

I had a discussion with my team on our WhatsApp group (I am young and hip like that) about a story in May 2019 on Jeff Bezos’ strategy to offer Amazon employees $10,000—in addition to up to three months’ pay—if they quit the company and start a package delivery business. A little backstory, the decision was motivated by Amazon’s new Delivery Service Partner program which got tens of thousands of applicants including the employees. Hesitant about transitioning into owning a venture, Bezos decided incentivize them for taking the risk.

The chat with my team was positive. Of course Bezos gets an A for this brilliant strategic decision. But one member brought up how most companies wouldn’t dare encourage such a move! For one thing, they want to be the lifeblood of employees’ lives to a crippling fault. Employers take up the savior role and elevate themselves to “If it weren’t for this job, where would you be?” Reality dictates otherwise; companies wouldn’t be where or who they were without their employees and customers. As managers and leaders, we talk a lot about empowering the workforce and investing in our team but how many of us walk the walk?

“Companies like to take up the savior role and elevate themselves to ‘If it weren’t for this job, where would you be?’ when in all actuality it’s the other way around, companies wouldn’t be where or who they were without their employees and customers.”

Bezos is challenging us like never before and Tanzanians leaders need to have the great discussions surrounding trust, loyalty and culture. Values that I believe are at the core of many of our ill performing companies. We fear a financially liberated and empowered workforce because we think they will leave us and become competition. So we hold on to employees who have mentally checked out of their jobs years ago. As a result, they underperform, are disengaged and toxic to the organization. Amazon’s decision however has killed two birds with one stone; creating a happy and trustworthy workforce that is fulfilled in pursuing their betterment outside of their 9-5 and increasing sales by having a workforce that is loyal to them and knows the products and company in and out.

“We hold on to employees who have mentally checked out of their jobs years ago. As a result, they underperform, are disengaged and toxic to the organization.”

If our employees are willing to walk away at the mention of this deal, there is something inherently wrong in how we choose to lead. And whether it is a good or bad initiative, employees will leave you anyway because of a lack of loyalty and trust. See, we don’t empower them because we fear they will leave us for our competition or that they will become the competition. But as leaders, part of our job is to build someone’s competitive edge regardless of our fears and interests. I talk about this in a previous Q&A blog; as a leader your best accomplishment should be you team. Their accomplishments and their recognition, as a unit or individually, reflect on our capabilities. If our leadership is so good that it inspired entrepreneurs, that’s an impressive bragging point.

“As a leader your best accomplishment is the team you lead being recognized because it means you are being recognized. If our leadership is so good that it inspired entrepreneurs, that’s an impressive bragging point. “

We have to unlearn the notion that company success has to come at the expense of Tanzanian workforce. In every context, how we treat the workforce also gives us a great reputation that garners a lot of support and loyalty from community stakeholders. The successes we have in our teams contribute significantly to growth at higher levels such as innovation and company vision. For instance businessman Charles Kindel, mastermind behind Amazon’s Alexa for Smart Home Devices, was mentored by Jeff Bezos for five years and largely credits him for his success as well as business lessons he applies today in his other ventures. There are many others who credit Bezos for his leadership role in their lives and we see today the positive influence it has had on his reputation as a person, a leader and businessman.

Do you wonder what Tanzanians CEOs think about this topic? I do! Over the next few weeks I’ll be talking to some of them and sharing their perspective here so we can hopefully push the discussion forward and get good ideas on how to execute in our market. Stay tuned!