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A review by kyscg
Amazon Unbound: Jeff Bezos and the Invention of a Global Empire by Brad Stone
challenging
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
4.25
I've always had a soft spot about Jeff Bezos and the Amazon story. I mean, starting an internet book store and turning it into a global empire worth more than one and a half trillion dollars using leverage, and the power of technology, is extraordinary. I bought a physical copy of Amazon Unbound from a local bookstore, back in 2021, and decided to finally read it this summer.
It's easy to read the book, partly because the story is captivating, but also because Brad Stone can spin a good yarn. So many times, I found myself stopping to think about how unreal what Amazon and Jeff Bezos were doing. Let us give the S-Team some credit too, so this means that the S-Team, and Jeff were working, more often than not, simultaneously, on the following things:
- Echo (Alexa)
- Go stores
- Fresh
- AWS
- Washington Post
- Expansion into India, China, Europe, and Mexico
- Fire Phone
- Kindle
- Primevideo
- Independent delivery system
- Advertisements
- Blue Origin
- HQ2
- Amazon PR
- COVID-19
While reading about Bezos' idea to sell steak on a truck by going around neighbourhoods, I realized that so much of Amazon's seemingly brilliant ideas would never have taken off if they didn't have the capital. So now, the question is, if you gave a lot of people (a statistically significant number) a lot of money, would they reproduce Amazon's results? Culture matters a lot, but are there other cultures that could achieve similar or greater levels of success?
Amazon opened up their store to sellers from China who flooded their market with low-quality ripoffs. So the question is, do you just give everything to the customer and let them make the choice or do you enforce a quality bar that all sellers have to cross? And on the next level, what does it mean for sellers that are making high quality originals if a Chinese clone will always take away their customer base?
Amazon Go and their "Just Walk Out Technology". How do you create the best store in the world?
I don't think Jeff was at his best with Blue Origin, maybe that was one step too much for the great man, maybe he was just unlucky. But Blue Origin should have done so much more.
What is the future of Amazon now? Can they afford to ignore structural and organizational inefficiencies and go innovating again? Or will Jassy have to iron out some kinks first?
These were questions I had, I will end with my favourite leadership principle from Jeff. Principle 8: Think Big. Thinking small is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
It's easy to read the book, partly because the story is captivating, but also because Brad Stone can spin a good yarn. So many times, I found myself stopping to think about how unreal what Amazon and Jeff Bezos were doing. Let us give the S-Team some credit too, so this means that the S-Team, and Jeff were working, more often than not, simultaneously, on the following things:
- Echo (Alexa)
- Go stores
- Fresh
- AWS
- Washington Post
- Expansion into India, China, Europe, and Mexico
- Fire Phone
- Kindle
- Primevideo
- Independent delivery system
- Advertisements
- Blue Origin
- HQ2
- Amazon PR
- COVID-19
While reading about Bezos' idea to sell steak on a truck by going around neighbourhoods, I realized that so much of Amazon's seemingly brilliant ideas would never have taken off if they didn't have the capital. So now, the question is, if you gave a lot of people (a statistically significant number) a lot of money, would they reproduce Amazon's results? Culture matters a lot, but are there other cultures that could achieve similar or greater levels of success?
Amazon opened up their store to sellers from China who flooded their market with low-quality ripoffs. So the question is, do you just give everything to the customer and let them make the choice or do you enforce a quality bar that all sellers have to cross? And on the next level, what does it mean for sellers that are making high quality originals if a Chinese clone will always take away their customer base?
Amazon Go and their "Just Walk Out Technology". How do you create the best store in the world?
I don't think Jeff was at his best with Blue Origin, maybe that was one step too much for the great man, maybe he was just unlucky. But Blue Origin should have done so much more.
What is the future of Amazon now? Can they afford to ignore structural and organizational inefficiencies and go innovating again? Or will Jassy have to iron out some kinks first?
These were questions I had, I will end with my favourite leadership principle from Jeff. Principle 8: Think Big. Thinking small is a self-fulfilling prophecy.