Working Backwards: Insights, Stories, and Secrets from Inside Amazon

Written by Colin Bryar and Bill Carr

Narrated by Colin Bryar, Bill Carr and Robert Petkoff

'Essential for any leader in any industry' – Kim Scott, bestselling author of Radical Candor

Working Backwards gives an insider's account of Amazon's approach to culture, leadership, and best practices from two long-time, top-level Amazon executives.

In 2018 Amazon became the world’s second trillion dollar company after Apple: a remarkable success story for a company launched out of a garage in 1994. How did they achieve this? And how can others learn from this extraordinary success and replicate it?

Colin Bryar started at Amazon in 1998; Bill Carr joined in 1999. Their time at Amazon covered a period of unmatched innovation that brought products and services including Kindle, Amazon Prime, Amazon Echo and Alexa, and Amazon Web Services to life. Through the story of these innovations they reveal and codify the principles and practices that have driven the success of one of the most extraordinary companies the world has ever known, from the famous 14-leadership principles, the bar raiser hiring process, and Amazon’s founding characteristics: customer obsession, long-term thinking, eagerness to invent, and operational excellence.

Through their wealth of experience they offer unprecedented access to the Amazon way as it was refined, articulated, and proven to be repeatable, scalable, and adaptable. Working Backwards shows how success is not achieved by the genius of any single leader, but rather through commitment to and execution of a set of well-defined, rigorously-executed principles and practices that you can apply at your own company, no matter the size.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pan Macmillan
• Release date: Feb 18, 2021
• ISBN: 9781529033861

Colin Bryar

COLIN BRYAR joined Amazon in 1998 — four years after its founding — and spent the next 12 years as part of Amazon’s senior leadership team as Amazon grew from a domestic (US-only) seller of books to a global, multi-dimensional powerhouse and innovator. For two of his years at Amazon, Colin was “Chief of Staff” to Jeff Bezos, AKA “Jeff’s shadow”, during which he spent each day attending meetings, traveling with, and discussing business and life with Jeff. After Amazon, he and his family relocated to Singapore for two years where Colin served as Chief Operating Officer of e-commerce company RedMart, which was subsequently sold to Alibaba. Colin is co-founder of Working Backwards LLC where he coaches executives at both large and early-stage companies on how to implement the management practices developed at Amazon.

Reviews for Working Backwards

[Karen Lopez · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Great book with a lot of insights into amazons working. A lot of useful info to put in practice in business.