Could I potentially file a lawsuit against AWS? Do you all perceive a viable legal case in this situation?
Highly emotional post.
I’ve been working at AWS for seven years, handling immigration issues and the inherent vulnerabilities they entail. During one of the most challenging periods of my life, AWS placed me on Focus shortly after returning from six weeks of parental leave. My child was born with severe medical complications, necessitating my early return to avoid job loss or health insurance cancellation.
At the time, I was a top performer with RSUs nearing vesting. However, the team needed to cut costs to improve their numbers on paper. Instead of layoffs, they opted for Focus/PIP.
The worst part was that the business was already struggling across the organization, and there were no customer projects available to deliver. Claiming that I wasn’t “delivering projects” felt dishonest, especially since many others were in the same situation, but only a few were targeted. If there are no customer projects available, how can anyone deliver anything? This was the only time in my seven years at AWS that there was no work for my skill set, so it wasn’t a skill issue but a macroeconomic issue. Also, when there’s no work, I didn’t sit idle. I raised my hand, asked for work, and helped two accounts with pre-sales to launch projects. But none of this counted towards my core goal. So, if I logged in every morning and asked for work, and AWS didn’t provide work because they didn’t have it, was I not delivering results?
To survive, I worked over 60-hour weeks, with timesheets approved for 60 hours as proof. I managed multiple customer projects, earned additional certifications, and eventually got off Focus. All this while taking care of a medically fragile child and living with the fear that losing my job could force my family to leave the country immediately. This would have directly endangered my child’s life because the medical support they depend on isn’t available back home.
What makes this situation even more difficult to accept is that the three skip managers involved were later removed during a leadership cleanup, while I’ve continued to perform strongly and received “Exceeds” ratings multiple times.
If AWS didn’t have business and money to pay their staff they can do layoffs, which they always do. But choosing the PIP route to save money felt dishonest and cheap.
I still can’t fully let this go. Putting someone in such a vulnerable situation under that kind of pressure felt deeply cruel. I’m curious to hear constructive thoughts on this matter.