New Trend in America: Manager Positions No Longer in Demand, Replaced by This
US technology companies are beginning to abandon traditional job structures. Amazon is one of them, eliminating titles such as senior, manager, and lead, replacing them with the single term ‘builder’.
This initiative is being trialled in the Ring and Blink home security units. Starting next month, hundreds of product employees will no longer use formal titles. They will be called ‘builders’, while their superiors become ‘builder leads’.
Citing Reuters, the company wants to overhaul its work structure to make it more flexible and focused on outcomes. Chief Product Officer Jason Mitura stated that the company aims to become a forward-looking organisation more open to change.
Amazon is also introducing new measures of success. Performance will no longer be evaluated based on titles or seniority, but on one thing: the value created for customers.
In Silicon Valley, the term ‘builder’ is gaining popularity for workers who can complete projects independently, often with the aid of artificial intelligence.
Meta has even started using the title ‘AI builder’, while payments company Block has introduced the term ‘player-coach’ for some managers.
At Amazon, this title change is part of CEO Andy Jassy’s agenda to cut bureaucracy. The company has even launched an internal hotline for employees to report processes deemed overly complicated.
However, the policy has raised concerns. Some employees believe the removal of titles like senior or lead could make promotion paths unclear. Amazon has traditionally had a salary structure dependent on job levels.
Some workers also worry that the change will be extended across the entire company. If that happens, Amazon’s organisational structure could shift dramatically from hierarchical to flatter.
Amazon has denied these concerns. The company asserts that compensation, promotions, and career paths remain the same. According to management, the change will actually accelerate experimentation and improve efficiency.