Last Updated:March 11, 2025, 18:21 IST

Amazon’s early offices weren’t exactly glamorous. A former employee Steve Yegge described them as “dark and grungy.” He revealed Jeff Bezos was never difficult to work with but always had super-high expectations.

Steve Yegge initially joined Amazon to help coordinate projects but eventually climbed the ranks. (Photo Credits: Instagram)

Long before Jeff Bezos became one of the richest men in the world, he was a hands-on, intensely focused leader steering Amazon through its early days. One of the people who witnessed this firsthand was Steve Yegge, a former Amazon employee who recently shared his memories of working with the tech mogul. Steve, now 56, joined Amazon back in 1998 as a technical programme manager. At that time, the company was still in its infancy, just four years past its humble beginnings in Jeff’s garage.

Speaking to Business Insider, Steve recalled that Bezos had an undeniable magnetism. “He had this electric presence, a magnetism to him that was unmistakable,” Steve said. But while Bezos was deeply involved in every aspect of the company, his relentless focus on the mission sometimes meant that other concerns fell by the wayside.

“He didn’t seem to care about anything other than his mission. It didn’t matter if the toilet was dirty or if engineers were being paged all night long. He seemed to only care if it started slowing him down. Maybe that’s the kind of leader you have to be. Successful leaders don’t take no for an answer,” Steve explained.

Amazon’s early offices weren’t exactly glamorous, either. Steve described them as “dark and grungy,” yet the energy inside was electric. “Once you stepped into the building, there was a crackle in the air. You could feel that something really big was going on and it was all centred on Jeff,” he recalled.

The workplace culture, however, was intense. Employees were under constant pressure and work-life balance was almost nonexistent. “People avoided asking for time off. Some employees would berate others. A friend of mine worked in a closet because that’s the only place where there was room for a desk,” Steve admitted.

Steve initially joined Amazon to help coordinate projects but eventually climbed the ranks, leading an engineering team and working directly with Bezos on a top-secret initiative. The goal? To build a platform that, in retrospect, sounded a lot like Reddit. “I didn’t know enough about distributed computing to pull off what Jeff wanted in his desired timeframe. I felt the project wasn’t feasible at the time, but I was scared to deliver that message to Jeff,” he confessed.

By 2005, an enticing offer from Google convinced Steve to move on. Looking back, he admitted that Amazon wasn’t exactly his dream workplace. “I didn’t really like working there and don’t agree with the company’s practices,” he reflected. Still, he acknowledged the value of his time working alongside Bezos.

top videos

View all

Swipe Left For Next Video

View all

“He’d reset us and change how everyone in the company thought about things. He challenged people every day, but I never saw him get mad or swear in my almost seven years there. He was never difficult to work with, even though he could be difficult to work for at times because of his super-high expectations,” Steve explained.

While Amazon may have evolved into a corporate giant, Steve’s offers a rare glimpse into the company’s chaotic, high-pressure early days and the leadership style of the man who built it from the ground up.

News viral Ex-Amazon Engineer Says He ‘Didn’t Like Working There’, But Praises Jeff Bezos’ Leadership

Read More