Amazon has reportedly fired over half a dozen senior managers who were involved in a New York warehouse union.
The firings, which took place outside the company’s employee review cycle, was regarded as the company’s response to the Amazon Labor Union which formed in Staten Island last month in a “historic victory” against the country’s second largest employer, the New York Times reported, citing former and current employees who spoke on the condition anonymity.
Most of the managers who were fired were responsible for carrying out Amazon’s response to the unionization efforts, the New York Times reported. According to their LinkedIn profiles that were reviewed by the Times, some of the managers were with the company for more than six years.
Amazon said the changes were made after evaluating the warehouse’s “operations and leadership” for several weeks.
“Part of our culture at Amazon is to continually improve, and we believe it’s important to take time to review whether or not we’re doing the best we could be for our team,” the spokesperson said.
The managers were being fired due to an “organizational change”, two employees told the Times. One said that some of the managers had recently received positive performance reviews.
In April, Amazon workers at the Staten Island warehouse voted in majority to form a union. The victory marked the first successful American organizing effort in the company’s history. Organizers have faced an uphill battle against Amazon, which now employs more than one million people in the US and is making every effort to keep unions out.
Christian Smalls, who heads the Amazon Labor Union, said on Twitter he had met with President Joe Biden shortly after he harshly criticized Amazon during his testimony at
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