Prime Bezos
Lessons from Amazon's founder at his peak
A curated collection of Jeff Bezos's most important ideas on customers, decisions, invention, and building an enduring company — drawn from his shareholder letters, interviews, and speeches.
Obsess Over Customers, Not Competitors
Bezos consistently said that starting with the customer and working backward is the foundation of everything. Competitor-focused companies wait to see what others do. Customer-focused companies invent.
Think in Decades, Not Quarters
He was famously willing to forgo short-term profits for long-term market position. AWS, Prime, and the Kindle all required years of investment before paying off. Wall Street called him reckless. He turned out to be right.
Maintain a "Day 1" Mentality
He warned constantly about "Day 2" — stasis, irrelevance, and decline. Staying in Day 1 means maintaining the urgency, curiosity, and willingness to experiment of a startup, no matter how large you get.
Make High-Quality, High-Velocity Decisions
Bezos distinguished between irreversible decisions (which deserve deep analysis) and reversible ones (which should be made quickly with about 70% of the information you wish you had). Most decisions are reversible, so move fast.
Build on Things That Won't Change
Rather than chasing trends, he asked what customers would still want in 10 years — lower prices, faster delivery, wider selection — and invested heavily there. The answer to "what won't change?" is more useful than "what will?"
Disagree and Commit
When a team can't reach consensus, leaders should be willing to say "I disagree, but let's go with your approach and I'll commit fully." This prevents decision paralysis without requiring unanimity.
Treat Every Initiative Like a Startup
Amazon's "two-pizza teams" and the practice of writing six-page narrative memos instead of PowerPoints were designed to keep teams small, autonomous, and thinking clearly.
"Your Margin Is My Opportunity"
Bezos saw that incumbents' fat margins were vulnerabilities. By operating lean and passing savings to customers, Amazon made it nearly impossible for competitors to match their value proposition.
Failure and Invention Are Inseparable Twins
The Fire Phone flopped. Amazon Auctions went nowhere. But Bezos treated these as the cost of swinging for the fences, and the wins — AWS, Prime, Alexa — vastly outweighed the misses.
Earn Trust, Don't Manage Perception
Your brand is what people say about you when you're not in the room, and the only way to shape that is by genuinely delivering for customers — not through marketing spin.