Amazon Manager - Operations interview questions

To help other former military who may apply to Amazon Operations Manager here are some great points. I just finished the four round interview period in Indianapolis. They start you off very early in the morning. Make sure you ask the hotel about breakfast and coffee available before you attend the interview. When you walk into the staging area, it is go time. I would highly recommend to be part of the first set of interviewees. I found the first interview great as the guy was getting settled with his coffee. I found many of the Amazon recruiters as morning people so if you are not - you may want to find another company. The first interview was the math problem and the analytical writing assignment. The math problem is very easy. My guy had to send the prerequisite curve ball by adjusting the rate of unit flow half way through the 10 hour shift and wanted to know how many packers I would shift over to make up the increased volume needed to make the output packing target. Not hard math, just need to remember to make sure you give him both the new volume needed to complete the 5 hours remaining in the shift and how many more workers needed. The second interview was very painful. It dealt with your personal behavoral. A very senior GM led the interview. He was tough. Don't take it personal as he tries to rattle you. Be honest in your explanations. You need good examples of failures. They will focus more on the failures than successes to see how you learned. You will need good mentoring stories that went well and went bad. The third interview was on my resume. Keep the focus on the top two or three accomplishments. I did more and the lady had to stop me so she could ask here questions. It was not a problem she said, but she was required to ask certain questions on "tell me a time" type questions. The big thing that they wanted to see was leadership success, good and bad, and how you led projects. Definitely use the STAR method to lay the groundwork. At the end, I asked her how she say former military transitioning in the workplace and she gave me some great insight. The fourth interview was fun. The guy overheard some of my comments on how I wrote a book and used Amazon to publish it. Come up with some stories on how Amazon has changed your life or others that you know. It is more fooder. The last interview was on Amazon's core leadership principles. As a military person, you will have no problem here and the interviewer even mentioned it to me. However, you still need good examples. They really want to hear mistakes and how you learned and grew. You need to remember that even thou many of the interviewers had only worked at Amazon for a short period of time, they DO bring a lot of other experiences to the table. As a military person, I would plan on not having a former military person do your interview. None of my primary interviewers were military. I think Amazon may do that on purpose as to avoid favoritism. You need to arrive on time and look good. Amazon really likes former military. There is a huge group already imbedded and growing. Perhaps I will be conducting your interview in the future, should hear back in a few days if I get the offer.