I was shocked at the end of your story that it was Amazon you were talking about, but I'm assuming this story happened at least a few years ago. I know of one friend who was put on a PIP around 2013 or 2014 - he is still with the company, has been trusted to be the technical lead for several large and important projects, and the only thing standing between him and a promotion to L6 is laziness in preparing the paperwork.
Amazon seems to have changed the process to what they call the "pivot program" - when previously you would have been put on a PIP (and given severance if you accepted it and failed it), you are now given the choice of
1) take severance
2) appeal (you will almost certainly lose, I don't have data for this but have heard about many of these appeals and exactly zero have gone in favor of the employee)
3) do the PIP, and if you fail it you are fired with no severance
Given that you are now offered severance as an alternative to a PIP and don't get a penny if you fail it, being put in the pivot program is unambiguously a pink slip. Sad to be reminded that Amazon used to be good at this, I don't think they are anymore
I was shocked at the end of your story that it was Amazon you were talking about, but I'm assuming this story happened at least a few years ago. I know of one friend who was put on a PIP around 2013 or 2014 - he is still with the company, has been trusted to be the technical lead for several large and important projects, and the only thing standing between him and a promotion to L6 is laziness in preparing the paperwork.
Amazon seems to have changed the process to what they call the "pivot program" - when previously you would have been put on a PIP (and given severance if you accepted it and failed it), you are now given the choice of
1) take severance
2) appeal (you will almost certainly lose, I don't have data for this but have heard about many of these appeals and exactly zero have gone in favor of the employee)
3) do the PIP, and if you fail it you are fired with no severance
Given that you are now offered severance as an alternative to a PIP and don't get a penny if you fail it, being put in the pivot program is unambiguously a pink slip. Sad to be reminded that Amazon used to be good at this, I don't think they are anymore