Anticipating Amazon’s Next Moves With Principles, Then Speculation
Experts in my field are advancing “What Should Brands Expect From Amazon in 2019?” theories. These theories are expectedly speculative, ranging from data-driven to gut-driven. If you’re not up to speed with the data or the 2018 in review, these are two particularly good articles:
- Amazon 2018 Review published on Vox
- Online Marketplaces 2018 Review by Marketplace Growth
When it comes to theories, let’s remember that nobody can predict the future. Que sera sera. Let’s also agree that anticipation is an advanced leadership skill worth developing. Bezos just emphatically reiterated this in this short 60 second video (shared on Linkedin).
Any theories about the future should aspire to use principles as described Stephen Covey’s famous book and Ray Dahlio’s recent book, Principles. These naturally occurring rules about how things work produce stronger conclusions. For example, one applicable principle is that Amazon’s eComm business is governed by rules of a search engine. 75% of customers start their visit with a search (according to Amazon). Search engines have been around longer than Amazon, and there are more of them to study.
Amazon is a huge company, comprised of modularized units which is brilliantly described in this post by Ben Thompson. Because Amazon’s isolated modules behave differently from one another but on the whole the organization moves ore uniformly, theories founded in macro level behaviors (top-down) are superior to micro-level behaviors (bottom-up). An example of this is that Amazon’s responsibility to shareholders will supersede the responsibility of its individual teams like Amazon Fresh. Amazon will follow profit and scale wherever it exists.
Lastly, assume that past decisions are an unreliable foundation for generating conclusions about the future. Amazon is a company that moves fast, tries new things and thwarts convention. It’s better to look at Amazon Leadership Principles to anticipate what they’ll do: https://www.amazon.jobs/en/principles. Not only is this a solid foundation for developing hypotheses, but it’s also fun.
Hopefully this helps guide your interpretation of the predictions, and informs your ability to make your own theories.