Tag Archives: amazon

Mechanisms

March 6, 2020
Amazon Way, Business, Clarity of Thought, Customer & Product, Leadership, Organization & People, Technology & Execution
3 Comments

Mechanisms are complete processes built around a tool, owned by a leader that gets adopted broadly and regularly inspected and improved to ensure things get done, not because everyone has good intentions, but because the mechanism’s elements structurally force the desired behavior. “Good intentions never work, you need good mechanisms to make anything happen.” — Jeff Bezos I’ve written previously about how Good Intentions are Never Enough and why mechanisms are needed, but I didn’t go deep into how to make mechanisms actually work. …Continue reading →

Friday was my last day at Amazon

April 30, 2018
Kindel, Skiing
10 Comments

The goodbye mail to the Alexa Smart Home team explains it all pretty well: Date: Apr 27, 2018 3:03 PM Subject: Smart Home Org Update Team, With mixed emotions I share the news that Charlie Kindel has decided to leave Amazon. Charlie has accomplished many things in his time here, not the least of which is the founding and scaling of Alexa Smart Home. Alexa would not be the leader in Smart Home that it …Continue reading →

Details Matter in Presenting Narratives

April 18, 2018
Amazon Way, How To, Leadership, Writing
1 Comment

Narratives are written documents used to present clear thinking. Narratives enable readers to quickly understand the author’s ideas in order to drive robust conversations and decisive decision making. Details matter when it comes to printing narratives for others to read. Sloppy presentation of the written word detracts from content and shows the author lacks obsession about his or her customer (the reader). Authors must apply a very high standard for making it easy and pleasing …Continue reading →

Keeping Tracks of Books I Read

October 26, 2012
Books, Uncategorized
15 Comments

Each January I post a list of books I read during the previous year (one of my favorites this year is @Scalzi’s Redshirts). Even though almost all books I read are via Amazon and Kindle, it is still a total pain in the butt to create those blog posts. http://ceklog.kindel.com/category/passions/books/ This has me thinking about a potential app idea and I’d love to hear from YOU about how you keep track, document, list, and share …Continue reading →