An inside look at the system that will outlast Bezos—Bill Carr & Colin Bryar on lessons from Amazon

Today’s episode is with Bill Carr and Colin Bryar, two long-time Amazon executives who just published a new book, “Working Backwards,” which provides an inside look at how the leadership principles and business processes that have made the company so successful. Bill started at Amazon in 1999, and went on to launch and run the Prime Video, Amazon Studios, and Amazon Music businesses before he left the company in 2014. Colin joined Amazon in 1998, as the Director for Amazon Associates and Amazon Web Services Programs. He also spent two years as Jeff Bezos’ technical advisor or “shadow,” and later served as the COO for IMDb.com.  In today’s conversation, Bill and Colin take us through Amazon’s culture of innovation and the origin stories of the Kindle, AWS, and Prime businesses. From granular details about the “working backwards” process, to an inside look at how players like Jeff Bezos and incoming CEO Andy Jassy operated up close, they share invaluable insights on diving deep and operational excellence. Whether it’s their lessons on why innovation can’t be a part-time job, or the perils of taking a “skills-forward” approach to exploring new opportunities, or why mechanisms are more important than good intentions, there’s lots of food for thought in here for founders and startup leaders. Learn more about “Working Backwards” here You can email us questions directly at [email protected] or follow us on Twitter @twitter.com/firstround and @twitter.com/brettberson