How to Protect Your Job During Amazon Layoffs

Amazon cut 30,000 corporate employees between October 2025 and January 2026. That is roughly 10% of the corporate workforce and the largest reduction in the company's 31-year history. The first wave took 14,000 people in October. The second took 16,000 in January.

CEO Andy Jassy described the cuts as "not really financially driven" and "not even really AI-driven." He framed them as organizational: reducing layers, increasing ownership, and removing bureaucracy. The stated goal, announced in September 2024, was to increase the ratio of individual contributors to managers by at least 15%.

In the retail division, more than 78% of eliminated roles were mid-level managers at L5 through L7. That is a specific pattern. Amazon did not cut evenly across the organization. It cut the middle.

This came on top of 27,000 employees cut between November 2022 and March 2023. Amazon's workforce had grown from 798,000 in 2019 to 1.6 million by 2022, driven by pandemic e-commerce demand. When that demand normalized, the company found itself with far more people than it needed. The 2025-2026 rounds are the continuation of that correction, not the start of it.

Amazon has two layoff systems running at the same time

Most companies have one mechanism for reducing headcount. Amazon has two, and they operate on different timelines.

The formal layoff rounds are the ones that make headlines. These are company-wide decisions to eliminate roles, announced by leadership, with severance packages and 90-day internal job search windows. The October 2025 and January 2026 rounds were this type. They cost Amazon an estimated $1.8 billion in severance for the October round alone.

The PIP pipeline is quieter and runs continuously. Amazon's Performance Improvement Plan process has two stages: "Focus" (initial PIP) and "Pivot" (second stage, with the option to leave with a severance package). In April 2022, fewer than 2,000 employees were on Focus. By end of 2022, that number had climbed to over 3,300 per month. By January 2023, the number of employees entering Pivot had doubled.

Amazon's official position is that "role eliminations reflect the business need for a specific type of position" and are "unrelated to our performance management process." A former Amazon HR staffer told a different story: the process was driven by metrics to move employees out, with managers directed to ensure the company met its 6% Unregretted Attrition (URA) target.

Whether you call it a PIP or a layoff, the outcome is the same: you are out. The difference is that the PIP pipeline allows Amazon to reduce headcount without calling it a layoff and without triggering the same severance obligations or WARN Act requirements.

Who Amazon is cutting and why

The 2025-2026 rounds have a clear profile: mid-level managers are the primary target.

78% of eliminated retail roles were L5 to L7 managers. Jassy's stated goal of increasing the IC-to-manager ratio by 15% is not abstract organizational theory. It is a formula that identifies which roles to eliminate. If you are a manager at L5, L6, or L7 and you manage a small team, your role is the kind of role Amazon is removing.

AWS, retail, and HR operations all took cuts. The pattern crosses divisions. This was not one business unit struggling and shedding headcount. It was a company-wide restructuring focused on removing management layers.

The 5-day return-to-office mandate is part of the same strategy. Amazon implemented a full five-day RTO requirement alongside these cuts. Employees who could not or would not comply self-selected out. The mandate functions as a headcount reduction tool that does not appear on any layoff list.

What this means for ICs vs. managers:

If you are an individual contributor, the 2025-2026 rounds are less directly threatening to you. Amazon is reducing the ratio of managers to ICs, which means it wants more ICs per manager, not fewer ICs. That said, being an IC does not make you immune. The PIP pipeline targets ICs through the performance management system, and future rounds may shift focus.

If you are a manager at L5 through L7, you are in the profile Amazon is actively reducing. Your team's performance may be strong. That does not matter if Amazon decides your management layer is the one being removed.

How to assess your personal risk

If you are a manager:

1. How many direct reports do you have? Managers with small teams are the easiest to eliminate. If you manage fewer than six people, you are a candidate for consolidation. Your reports would be redistributed and your role would not be backfilled.

2. Is there another manager at your level covering a similar function? If two L6 managers each own a piece of the same problem area, Amazon's restructuring math says one of you is enough.

3. Can you demonstrate impact beyond people management? The managers who survive restructurings are the ones who also own technical decisions, customer outcomes, or cross-team coordination that cannot be replaced by moving their reports to another manager.

If you are an IC:

1. What is your most recent performance rating? Amazon's PIP pipeline runs continuously. If you received a rating that puts you in the bottom bucket, your 6% URA target exposure is real. A manager who needs to meet attrition targets will start with the weakest ratings.

2. Is your team in a growth area? AWS and core retail are large and diverse. Some sub-teams are growing. Others are flat or shrinking. Pay attention to whether your specific group is hiring, frozen, or losing headcount.

3. Does your work connect to a Leadership Principle that Amazon is emphasizing right now? Jassy's restructuring rhetoric centers on "ownership" and "bias for action." Engineers whose work demonstrates those principles at a visible scale are harder to cut than those who execute assigned tasks.

What to do right now

If you are a manager, build your case for why your layer should exist. This sounds harsh, but it is the actual question Amazon leadership is asking about every management role. Document the decisions you make that your reports cannot make alone. Show the outcomes your team produces that require your coordination. If you cannot articulate that clearly, start looking for an IC role or an external position while you have leverage.

If you are an IC, protect your performance rating. Amazon's official position is that PIPs and layoffs are unrelated. The data says otherwise. The PIP pipeline scales up before and during layoff periods. A strong performance rating is not a guarantee, but a weak one is a liability. Make sure your manager knows what you shipped, the metrics it moved, and how it connects to your team's goals. Do not wait for review season. The broader playbook for protecting yourself before a layoff applies here too.

Build internal mobility options. Amazon gives affected employees 90 days to find an internal role. Engineers who already have relationships with hiring managers on other teams use those 90 days to transfer. Engineers who do not have those relationships use them to job search externally. Start building connections on teams you would want to join, particularly in AWS growth areas or new AI-related initiatives.

Document your work continuously. Keep a running list of what you shipped, the customer or business impact, and the decisions you made. Update it every week or two. If you need to interview internally or externally on short notice, this is the material that makes the difference between a strong narrative and a scramble to remember what you did.

Amazon's restructuring is a new operating model, not a one-time event

Jassy did not describe these cuts as a response to a downturn. He described them as a structural change in how Amazon operates. Fewer managers, more ICs, faster decision-making, less bureaucracy. That framing means the pressure on management layers will continue even after the current rounds end.

For ICs, the PIP pipeline and its URA targets have existed for years and will continue to exist. Amazon will cut people again. The question is whether you are positioned on the right side of the changes it is making.

You cannot control Amazon's restructuring decisions. You can control whether the right people know your work and whether you have options if your role is eliminated. The engineers and managers who come out of this well will be the ones who treated those things as part of their job.

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