AR - Great Company For Experience
Pros
Amazon is a great company for experience, even in the world of finance. I worked at an Amazon Robotics Center. You will be introduced to a magnitude of systems, portals, and websites both made specifically by/for Amazon and commonly used throughout the business industry. Many opportunities to own projects and to track success and articulate what you learned from failure. This can serve you incredibly well in future employment. There are always a lot of opportunities at Amazon. I started working as a college hire for inbound operations for a new launch site and after 2 years transfered into finance with no finance or accounting experience and a business admin degree. I felt like I was accepted primarily due to my success in operations management.
Cons
In Amazon finance, focuses and standard work is different than finance in any other industry. The company does not make operational decisions based on dollars. Since fulfillment centers are only an expense the end goal is to only minimize costs. So goals are set on a regional level and trickle down to the specific sites based on averages and YoY data. A finance analyst may find themselves more as a business analyst and labor planner. The only finance a fullfulment center analyst may find themselves doing, is researching cost benefits for projects to capitalize and figuring out which buckets to use. But I never felt that a dedicated analyst was even necessary for this since again, many tools and processes can be filled out by anyone to get the answer you need. Also, fulfillment center finance is a solo role. You are alone with your direct finance leadership typically offside and in charge of a group of centers on a regional level. The GM is suppose to be a counterpart (making 4x your salary) but the chain of command is outside the operational scope of fulfillment. This can create times where it feels like "You against the world." In a world of operations you may find yourself as the only person standing between operations and a project "they really want done", done. You'll have to defend your logic on the costs and benefits of projects or acquisitions your ops counterparts want done. Finance Managment also always wants their site subordinates to be owning a project or initiative. Always tracking success and noting how you'll learn from failure is great but MASSIVELY overused and the root cause of the large turnover Amazon finance sees.
