Amazon before it’s Prime with Former VP of Amazon Music and Prime Video, Bill Carr #16
At the height of the Dot-com Bubble in the late 90s, Bill Carr came across a rare opportunity to be a part of internet-giant, Amazon. After a hugely successful career spanning 15 years as Vice President of Prime Video, Amazon Studios and Amazon Music, he stepped down to reflect on his experience. Bill is now co-author of the newly published ‘Working Backwards’, a first person account of Amazon’s revolutionary principles and processes, which catalysed the launch of such businesses as Kindle, Prime, and AWS.
In this episode, Bill shares his once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to become part of one of the fastest growing internet companies in the world, the lessons he took forward from Procter & Gamble, and how your long term success is forged not on easier roles, but on the resilience you grow through challenging times.
Lee & bill discuss:
Lessons from Bill’s time at Procter & Gamble and Amazon
The feeling of possibility when arriving at Amazon
Fighting established competitors to launch Amazon Prime Video
Working with his talented team on products with tangible world impact
Finding most personal growth in tougher times
How Bill’s new book aims to highlight Amazon’s revolutionary management style
Links & references:
Lee Cooper: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leecooperrecruiter/
Bill Carr: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bill-carr/
Working Backwards: Insights, Stories, and Secrets from Inside Amazon: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Working-Backwards-Insights-Stories-Secrets/dp/1529033829
Get in touch: lee@extrology.com
Episode highlights:
“In the US it was not uncommon, when I was a boy, to have families who have doctors, lawyers or accountants. But to grow up in a family of chemical engineers was unusual to be sure. ” - 4:38 - Bill Carr
“I was reading skateboarding magazines and some of my early heroes really were punks, like punk rock stars - these skateboarders like Tony Alva, George Powell, someone-Peralta, I can hardly hardly recall their names, but I thought they were super cool.” - 9:25 - Bill Carr
“It was somewhat prestigious to actually land a job and work at Procter & Gamble and, certainly in the 70s, 80s, and part of the 90s, it was considered a great factory for leaders and general managers.” - 13:24 - Bill Carr
“I realised that my progression upward was going to be really slow. I came to realize later of course, a part of it was that if you don't work in a growth company, then you have to either crawl over people or wait for them to die or retire.” - 15:15 - Bill Carr
“I was incredibly lucky just to have appeared at the doors of Amazon at that time, because these things happen so infrequently in history.” - 21:27 - Bill Carr
“It's very hard to bootstrap a subscription service from zero, for 2 reasons. One is you start off with no subscribers and two, it's actually very expensive. It's a fixed fee business to go get those movies and TV shows. So if you want to get Breaking Bad on your service, you're gonna pay x-millions of dollars for that property, whether it's watched once or 100 million times.” - 30:15 - Bill Carr
“Apple had a huge distribution advantage over us. Coming up with a solution to that would take a long time. It wasn't really until streaming became possible and Amazon started making its own devices that served movies and TV shows and music, starting with the fire tablet, which actually gave us a big boost back in 2010. So I started in 2004, and it wasn't really until 2010, that the picture started to look promising.” - 36:57 - Bill Carr
“I was working alongside incredibly talented managers and leaders. Whether that's Jeff Bezos, Jeff Wilkie, Jason Kyler or Steve Cassell, there were so many people that I had the ability to work with day to day that are among the most talented business leaders of their generation.” - 40:45 - Bill Carr
“What almost no one associates with Amazon is this company is one of the most well managed companies, and has developed its own Management Science that, in my opinion, should be studied and held up in the same esteem as Toyota’s quality management.” - 53:34 - Bill Carr
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