“The tradition is to throw hats in the air!” Says a voice in the audience. On the platform, about forty people proudly hold up a framed certificate with one hand. On the other, they grab their black headgear and throw it over their heads, all smiles. This scene inspired by Hollywood films does not take place on a Californian campus, but in one of the reception rooms of the warehouse of the giant of logistics Amazon, in Brétigny-sur-Orge, at the end of May . These employees have just graduated from the new “Amazon School”, created in partnership with the National Agency for Adult Vocational Training (Afpa).
Its primary goal: to enable its participants to showcase their know-how in logistics by obtaining a diploma certified by the State. But this internal school is also an opportunity for the American giant to improve its image. Regularly criticized for the working conditions it offers, reprimanded for its precarious jobs, the company intends to show that you can have a long career there. After 22 years of presence in France, the company of Jeff Bezos even claims a form of industrial paternalism, this social support for employees theorized at the end of the 19th century, supposed to strengthen the esprit de corps of the workers. “After having been very focused on customers, we are now looking to become the best employer in the world”, assures Jon Scott, human resources director of Amazon France Logistique.
Employees facing robots
Launched in 2019, interrupted for a time by the pandemic, the training is aimed at volunteer logistics agents who have been employed for at least a year at Amazon. During these 119 paid hours over four weeks, the volunteers validate the achievements of their daily work – wrapping a pallet, unloading a truck – and broaden their theoretical bases – they learn what barcodes mean that they scan, for example. “I never had any specific training in logistics before working with them, explains Denis, 51, working at Amazon’s Brétigny-sur-Orge center since September 2019. I have a commercial profile at the start, and I wanted to learn more about the theoretical aspect of this profession.” An opportunity for many of those whom the company likes to call its “associates”: occupying low-skilled employment positions, the “Amazonians” of the first promotion insist on the interest of obtaining certification for their know-how . “I worked a lot in accounting and sales and I thought it would be nice to have an additional diploma”, agrees Sylvie, who has been with the company for six years. This certification allows the employee to obtain a diploma equivalent to a CAP-BEP.
However, it does not give access to new skills: the company intends to recognize the know-how of its employees on tasks already acquired in their daily lives. “The bulk of the positions at Amazon are low-skilled, with a daily life strongly marked by the robotization of work”, notes Francesco Massimo, doctoral student at Sciences Po, author of an ongoing survey on the logistics giant. The Brétigny-sur-Orge site is a good example of this phenomenon. Covering an area of 152,000 square meters, spread over three floors, the warehouse is almost entirely automated.
Pamper your employees
In this sorting center, everything has to go very quickly: the time that elapses between the arrival of an ordered product and its dispatch to the customer generally does not exceed two hours. This efficiency is made possible by streamlining the chain. Here, there are no forklift drivers or handlers who travel miles to transport goods. These are robots that bring shelves overflowing with products in front of employees only responsible for scanning them, before everything is sent to the packaging stage. “In Brétigny, an important part of the process being robotized and standardized, the autonomy and the capacity of the individual to show initiative are even more reduced compared to the warehouses of older generations”, continues Francesco Massimo. The employee learns to make a gesture, an action, to fit into a cadence. “It is significant to see such a work organization organize a training course, to enhance skills that are increasingly impoverished on a daily basis with robotization”, further notes the researcher.
A way to pamper their employees despite working conditions often described as difficult. In 2018, a 217-page report from the company’s Health and Safety Committee (CHSCT) worried about working conditions at Amazon France. In the Montélimar logistics warehouse, 44% of those questioned said at the time that they had consulted a practitioner for health problems related to their work. In April, several strikes were also carried out over wage negotiations, sometimes extending until the beginning of May on certain sites.
A “dynamic and positive” work environment
“Amazon’s image as an employer is not necessarily good in the eyes of the public. In a tight labor market, with difficult recruitments, it is logical that such a group, which is growing , seeks to show that it wants to be attentive to the training and working conditions of its employees,” said François Lévêque, professor of economics at Mines ParisTech and author of Hyper-powerful corporations, Giants and Titans, the end of the global model ? (ed. Odile Jacob). Especially since Amazon, which employs more than 10,000 people in France, is recruiting. “More than 3,000 positions have been opened this year, and we are constantly recruiting”, confirms Jon Scott. The American giant thus insists on its annual turnover “below the averages observed in France”. “It is around 15% for the average company, while among permanent Amazon employees, it is below 10%. This is proof that the working environment is dynamic and positive”, tells us the group.
Navigating between the participants in the conference, Jon Scott highlights the “attention” paid by the company to its employees, citing in particular the “presence of an anonymous psychological assistance line”, available to them, as well as to that of their family. “Amazon’s external image does not at all reflect the internal reality, he repeats over and over again. These are not the big bad guys that we often portray. Here, we are careful”. Finished, the image of the American ogre ready to devour everything in its path to gain market share?
“Amazon must adapt”
“The group has matured, notes François Lévêque. It is now a company almost like the others, which is installed in the landscape. It is therefore less disruptive than before”. The group clearly intends to give pledges of respectability: the “Amazon School” graduation ceremony was thus preceded by a conference-debate on “the challenges of vocational training in sectors in tension”, organized in presence of representatives of Afpa, but also of Pôle emploi.
“Having now a storefront, Amazon must adapt. It is a company which now wants to return to the norm”, underlines the economist again. And intends to continue on this path: after the 42 graduates this year, 300 candidates could participate in the next training.