[Prolixium]

> You don't get rewarded for preventing bad things.

A few years ago I saw a promotion announcement e-mail come into my inbox for a colleague who sat a few steps from my desk. It was filled with the usual "did this, did that, made an impact, etc." statements but it also had a large section dedicated to the analysis this employee performed and presented to kill a huge initiative before the organization rolled it out. The initiative was very innovative but it ultimately wouldn't have achieved its goals. It was encouraging to see this in a promotion announcement and indicated to me that some organizations do explicitly reward for preventing bad things.

This was at AWS.

[blueboo]

Might be an exception that proves the rule. Killing a major initiative might’ve been a boon for sibling initiatives m — no wonder those leads applaud an underling who usefully twisted the knife. Politics — is Amazon known for it?…

[padjo]

That’s not what exception that proves the rule means. “Parking allowed only on Tuesdays” is an exception that proves the rule. This is just an exception that disproves the rule, like most exceptions.

[_a_a_a_]

Or it might not. Have you any reason to search for the negative in a prima facie positive?

[kelnos]

My experience matches with the GP. In my ~20-year professional life, I can't recall even one instance when I'd read a promotion announcement and saw that one of the person's accomplishments was that they prevented something bad from happening. Sure, it's possible I'm forgetting, but such a thing seems odd enough to me that it feels like something I'd notice and remember. I expect most people will have a similar experience.

It's also possible that people are getting praise for these sorts of "negative accomplishments" in private, or on performance reviews. Which is better than nothing, but I think it's still valuable and healthy to remind people that part of the job isn't just building stuff, it's also making sure the right things get built. And public praise for killing bad things is a good way to do that.

[_a_a_a_]

I've never seen it either but that's irrelevant. The original guy talked about someone blocking a crap project with good results. That's a positive.

So someone responds by assuming it's a negative: "...applaud an underling who usefully twisted the knife". I mean maybe, but quite possibly maybe not. But some people seem wired to find the worst.

[novok]

It's a save-the-budget kind of thing. By showing that we don't need X or can delay buying Y for 1 year, saved the company from $ZZ million dollars of spend. It might not be stopping other people from working, but it is praised.

[randmeerkat]

> Have you any reason to search for the negative in a prima facie positive?

This article from three days ago: “'Stress, burnout, churn, and a cut-throat atmosphere': An internal Amazon study slams the company's culture.”

https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-earths-best-employer-...