Gen Z has a long checklist for their early careers: solid pay, work-life balance, and a trajectory that won’t be erased by AI. But according to Amazon CEO Andy Jassy, the dream of landing a great job straight out of college is the first thing that needs to go — because it almost doesn’t work that way.
“If you’re not willing to start at the bottom and pay your dues, it’s unlikely you’ll ever succeed,” Jassi told Capital Group earlier this year. The power of advice podcast. “You have to be willing to start at the bottom. Whatever people ask you to do, you have to do it within reason.”
Being known as reliable, detail-oriented, and tireless is what builds the foundation for all that comes next, the 58-year-old said.
That desire to grind, Jassi argued, is what separates the ascendants from the exiters. During his nearly 29 years at Amazon — an expansion that saw the company grow from a few hundred employees to more than 1.5 million worldwide — he has seen a trait that consistently separates the best performers: a passion for learning to default to what’s already been done.
“You just have to be a learning machine,” Jassy said.
fate Amazon has been reached out for further comment.
A young Jassi never set his sights on the C-suite — he tried sports and coaching before landing at Amazon.
Jesse’s own career is proof that the road to the top rarely runs in a straight line.
Despite his long tenure at Amazon, he didn’t start out with a clear destination in tech or e-commerce. Growing up in New York as a devoted Giants fan, he dreamed of becoming a professional athlete; He also played football at Harvard before admitting that elite athletics wasn’t in the cards.
After graduation, he pursued sports, sports production, and coaching. Later came work as a paralegal, exploration of investment banking, and brushes with entrepreneurship.
He joined Amazon in 1997 after receiving an MBA from Harvard Business School. But his long trial and error was not wasted.
“It’s good to have an idea,” said Jassi. “But it’s very helpful to try lots of different things to find out what you don’t like and what you like.
“You never know what things you’re going to love. In my lifetime, I’ve never predicted the things I love.”
Jassi admits his advice is easier said than done
Jassi also recognizes that his brand’s exploratory thinking is easier said than done for today’s young workers. The workforce continues to experience massive shifts (including at Amazon), AI-driven automation, and a job market where a college degree no longer guarantees a clear on-ramp.
The pressure to quickly choose the right lane, and stick to it, has never been greater. Jessie’s own 22-year-old son’s friends, he said, are already feeling great pressure to figure out what they want to do with the rest of their lives.
Avoiding that mindset, he said, can be a career accelerator.
“If you can get over the idea that every time you’re exposed to someone new, it’s a pass-fail referendum on your merits, you’re going to get better,” Jassi said. “It puts unnecessary pressure on people, and that’s not how the real world works.”
The same goes for setbacks. Instead of treating failure as a judgment, Jassi said, it needs to be accepted as part of the process — something that happens to everyone who actually tries.
“There will be many times where things don’t work out the way you expect,” he said. “You’re going to face adversity, and you’re going to fail, and things don’t work out, and you have to realize that’s okay. It happens to everybody. You get up the next day and you start over.”
This story was originally featured on Fortune.com
