#232 Colin Bryar- Amazon's former Vice President on Leadership Principles & Working with Jeff Bezos

Colin Bryar joined Amazon in 1998 — four years after its founding — and spent the next 12 years as part of Amazon's senior leadership team as Amazon grew from a domestic (US-only) seller of books to a global, multi-dimensional powerhouse and innovator. Colin served as a Vice President at Amazon, and for two of his years was "Chief of Staff" to Jeff Bezos, AKA "Jeff's shadow", during which he spent each day attending meetings, traveling with, and discussing business and life with Jeff. After Amazon, he and his family relocated to Singapore for two years where Colin served as Chief Operating Officer of e-commerce company RedMart, which was subsequently sold to Alibaba. Colin is co-founder of Working Backwards LLC where he coaches executives at both large and early-stage companies on how to implement the management practices developed at Amazon. He is the author of WORKING BACKWARDS: Insights, Stories, and Secrets from Inside Amazon

EPISODE TIMELINE
2:44 Colin’s Early Career
12:43 How Colin Began Working at Amazon
19:35 What Colin is Best At
21:14 Amazon’s 14 Leadership Principles
25:44 Weaving Leadership Principles in Amazon’s Processes
27:14 Discovering Your Leadership Principles
35:45 Amazon’s Use of Narratives
42:46 Colin’s Role as Jeff’s Right Hand Man
54:13 Working Backwards

[buildingcoolstuff]

I love the internet! Being able to listen to some of Colin's mental models first-hand is amazing. Great interview!!