When my wife started preparing for her Amazon interview, I didn’t realize I was about to get a masterclass in leadership—without ever setting foot inside the company.
At the time, I just saw her buried in STAR frameworks and practicing behavioral questions aloud. She wasn’t in tech—her role was in vendor relationship management, onboarding sellers to Amazon and ensuring those relationships didn’t just start but scaled. I assumed once the interview ended, so would the intensity.
I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Because at Amazon, those 16 Leadership Principles aren’t just a hiring filter. They’re a way of life—woven into every decision, every meeting, every KPI. They weren’t posters on walls. They were behaviours, debates, and dilemmas. They were part of everything at Amazon, small things like emails and even 1:1!
And here’s how I saw them come alive—through her words, her experiences, and her growth.
I watched her not just recite them, but live them. And unknowingly, I began absorbing them too.
1. Customer Obsession
“Start with the customer and work backwards.”
She wasn’t working directly with end-users, but she was working with sellers—many of them small businesses relying on Amazon as a lifeline. Every onboarding decision, every support escalation, every nudge to optimize listings came from one place: How will this improve the seller’s success and in turn, the customer’s experience?
Even internal process changes were framed like this: “Will this make it easier for a seller to serve their customer better?” That mindset really stuck with me.
2. Ownership
“It’s not my job” isn’t a thing here.
What surprised me most was how accountable she felt for the sellers even after they were onboarded.
Their performance? Her concern. Their revenue growth? Her problem. Their feedback? Her responsibility to escalate and resolve. I asked her once, “Isn’t that someone else’s job after onboarding?” She laughed: “Not at Amazon. Ownership doesn’t stop when a task ends.”
3. Invent and Simplify
Amazon doesn’t reward complexity. In fact, it does the opposite.
Amazon deals with complexity at scale. But the best ideas my wife brought to her team were the simplest ones.
She helped create templates that made onboarding faster, recommended a clearer FAQ to reduce ticket volume, and tested small tweaks in onboarding calls that cut ramp-up time significantly.
Innovation doesn’t always mean shiny tools—it often means simplifying what’s already there.
4. Are Right, A Lot
It’s not about always having the answer—it’s about having sound judgment and good instincts, backed by data.
In vendor management, stakes are high—bad sellers can impact customer trust. Her instincts, honed by asking hard questions and being close to the ground, helped her flag red flags early.
But what impressed me more? She sought out opinions that challenged her own. “If I’m too confident,” she once told me, “I might be missing something.”
5. Learn and Be Curious
She didn’t come from an e-commerce background. But you’d never know that after three months at Amazon.
She read case studies, shadowed other teams, even mastered excel to analyze seller performance better. Not because anyone asked her to—but because curiosity was expected.
6. Hire and Develop the Best
Amazon isn’t just about hiring great talent—it’s about raising the bar with every hire.
While she wasn’t hiring directly, she was coaching new team members. And I saw how seriously she took that.
She’d spend weekends refining onboarding decks for internal use and would always ask herself: “How can I make this easier for the next person after me?” That’s leadership, even without a title.
7. Insist on the Highest Standards
“Good enough” was never good enough.
When her onboarding targets were met, she didn’t stop. She looked at churn, seller feedback, and time to first sale.
It wasn’t about meeting metrics—it was about delivering quality outcomes. “Just because a seller is onboarded doesn’t mean we’ve succeeded,” she’d say. “They need to thrive.”
8. Think Big
In one quarter, she proposed a new seller enablement model focused on underrepresented markets. It wasn’t on anyone’s roadmap, but it worked. The sellers onboarded through that model showed higher engagement and better revenue performance.
Thinking big at Amazon isn’t just allowed—it’s expected.
9. Bias for Action
“Most decisions are two-way doors.”
One of her favourite sayings became: “Let’s try it and measure.”
Whether it was testing new call scripts or changing the timing of follow-ups, she never waited for perfect data. She acted fast, learned faster, and optimised on the go.
10. Frugality
One of the most counterintuitive traits at a trillion-dollar company: doing more with less.
She didn’t always have the resources she wished for. But that never stopped her.
She built excel dashboards, automated reports with basic tools. Amazon’s frugality taught her: constraints create creativity.
11. Earn Trust
Listening actively. Speaking candidly. Admitting mistakes.
Her sellers trusted her because she was transparent, even when the news wasn’t good.
She wouldn’t sugarcoat delays or overpromise outcomes. And she’d always follow up—even on things outside her scope. That built real trust, the kind you don’t teach in management books.
12. Dive Deep
Surface-level answers don’t fly at Amazon.
Seller performance dipping? She’d dig through conversion data, pricing trends, even customer reviews.
I once saw her spend hours reconstructing a seller’s first 30 days to understand what went wrong—and how to fix it. “The devil’s in the data,” she’d say. And Amazon made sure she had access to all of it.
13. Have Backbone; Disagree and Commit
Disagreements weren’t personal—they were expected.
When her team was pushing a one-size-fits-all playbook, she challenged it. Not emotionally—just factually. With performance comparisons, seller sentiment, and logic.
She didn’t always win—but she was always heard. And once a decision was made, she gave it 100%.
14. Deliver Results
All principles are great—but in the end, it’s about delivering.
Targets. Revenue. Onboarding speed. Seller activation rates.
At the end of the day, results mattered. Her impact was measured not just in how many sellers joined—but how many succeeded.
No excuses. No fluff. Just results.
15. Strive to Be Earth’s Best Employer
I noticed how much thought went into inclusion, feedback, and career development. Leaders asked: Are people growing here? Are they happy? Are they safe?
It wasn’t lip service—it showed up in pulse checks, career plans, and manager 1:1s.
Internally, her team was constantly working on improving work-life balance, diversity, and growth conversations.
Amazon isn’t perfect, but I admired how it encouraged people to think: Are you making it easier for them to succeed here, or elsewhere?
16. Success and Scale Bring Broad Responsibility
Amazon’s size doesn’t let it hide. Every decision has consequences—environmental, social, and ethical.
This awareness was built into team goals. Leaders were expected to think not just about the impact today, but about the ripple effects tomorrow.
She often reflected on the responsibility of working at a company that touches millions of lives.
It wasn’t just about revenue—it was about ethical sellers, customer experience, sustainability in logistics, and inclusion in seller representation. “We can’t scale bad behaviour,” she’d say.
What I Learned
Watching my wife grow through these principles made me reflect on my own leadership journey. I learned that true leadership isn’t about having authority—it’s about taking responsibility, lifting others, and staying obsessed with those you serve.
She didn’t set out to be a textbook leader. But Amazon gave her the blueprint. And in watching her grow, I found myself growing too.
You don’t need to work at Amazon to live these values. But if you do adopt them – your work, your team, and even your mindset will never be the same again
And for that, I’m grateful—not just as a partner, but as a learner!
By the way, the lady in the picture is not my wife. She is AI-generated 😉 My wife looks much prettier than her! Also, if you are curious to know why my wife left Amazon, then blame the “Work from Office” policy.
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Here is the official Amazon link for the latest updates on leadership principles – https://www.aboutamazon.com/about-us/leadership-principles
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