Daybreak Amazon's legendary memo-writing culture is on its last leg
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Sep 22, 2025 For years, Amazon meetings began with employees absorbed in six-page memos, a practice that fueled major innovations like Prime and Alexa. Jeff Bezos famously banned PowerPoint, prioritizing clarity and robust discussions. Now, internal AI tools are radically changing this approach, drafting and summarizing documents in record time. While some embrace the new speed, others worry it's diminishing creativity and depth. The debate rages on: Is AI enhancing Amazon's culture or undermining the very practices that shaped its success?
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Silent Memo Ritual Drove Innovation
- Amazon meetings used to begin in silence with attendees reading detailed memos to force precise thinking.
- This ritual shaped major products like Prime, AWS, Kindle, and Alexa by prioritizing deep written clarity.
Writing Replaced Slides To Force Clarity
- Jeff Bezos banned PowerPoint in 2004 to force clarity through narrative writing.
- Amazon made memos the unit of thought, with length tied to meeting time and rigorous structure required.
Employees Learned By Struggling With Drafts
- Employees described sweating over drafts until writing sharpened their thinking and language.
- Multiple flagship initiatives began as documents and were debated extensively before approval.