In May 2022, Daniel Horaiwela, The 29-year-old Amazon warehouse assembler in San Antonio spoke at the company's shareholder meeting. As an employee, he owned a small number of stock options that he could buy, making him an official shareholder, but the warehouse worker had never before made a proposal at the annual meeting, which is typically dominated by big investors focused on Amazon's plans to boost profits and dividends.
Towards the end of the virtual meetingThe Amazon moderator played a two-minute recording that Olaywola had sent in advance. In a statement, Olayiwola said he was proposing a resolution to end the company's “injury crisis” by getting rid of productivity quotas and oversight mechanisms that force workers to prioritize speed over safety for fear of losing their jobs.
“I have personally felt the physical toll of working at Amazon,” he said in the recording. “I saw my colleagues working themselves to the point of exhaustion.”
permission he presented, included quotes from news investigations, research researchAnd state inspection report collectively showing that injury rates in Amazon warehouses were higher than in non-Amazon warehouses due to conditions that sometimes violated labor laws.
IN review he sent to shareholders Ahead of the meeting, Amazon pushed back against calls for a policy change, noting that its “rate of incidents among workers” had dropped since 2019. “Safety is integral to everything we do at Amazon, as demonstrated by our relentless focus on health and safety training, employee engagement, and improving our processes to improve working conditions,” the company said. “Our commitment to supporting the well-being and success of our employees is demonstrated by our competitive compensation and employee benefits.”
In a statement responding to questions for this story, Amazon spokesman Sam Stevenson defended the company's performance expectations, which he said are “based on time and seniority, co-worker performance, and adherence to safe work practices,” and the use of surveillance, which he said is “common practice at nearly every major retailer in the world” and helps “ensure employee safety, inventory quality or protection against theft.”
When Olayiwola's recording ended, there was a heavy silence on the line. The moderator then noted that Amazon recommended that shareholders vote against the resolution. And the majority did so, rejecting the offer.
Olayiwola wasn't sure he had just cost himself his job.
“I was really afraid to speak out for a long time, but I thought, like: Dude, they've already fired everyone you know. Just consider yourself fired“, he said. “I kept thinking, They can fire you at any time, and if they do, nothing you say will matter. Say what you're saying right now while you're here so they can't say I'm just saying it because I got fired.»
Amazon spokesman Stevenson said Olaywola's job was not at risk because “any retaliatory action will not be tolerated.”
But Olaiwola didn't know what to expect when it arrived in the warehouse next week. According to him, on the way to work he was stopped by his manager. To his surprise, the manager told Olaiwola that he respected him for speaking out. But, he added, working in an Amazon warehouse is still better than most alternatives. “It could have been a lot worse,” Olaiwola recalls the manager saying.
He wasn't fired. But none of his proposals were implemented.
So last summer he launched a podcast with a provocative name. Survive Skamazonby posting short episodes on YouTube, seven in total so far, monologues ranging from two to 10 minutes in length, each focusing on a different aspect of company policies and how they affect workers. The videos haven't gotten more than a few hundred views and are far from the polished productions of the staff writers, but they do represent a remarkable case of a low-wage, non-union worker creating an independent channel to publicly and non-anonymously address the company that actively employs them. Olaiwola hopes his initiative will encourage others to speak up, perhaps one day forming a huge digital choir demanding corporate accountability.
“The sooner we start dialogue, the sooner we can begin to understand what is happening and see what we can try to change or fix,” he said in a statement. first episode that aired in July.
The podcast is just part of his efforts to spread his message. Over the past year he has made interview With at least four news outlets published online in Fortuna and volunteered as a leader of United for Respect, an advocacy group that advocates on behalf of retail workers.
“Everyone was so afraid to speak up,” he said. “I felt like I had to do something to encourage others to talk about their experiences at Amazon.”
