As someone who is in another high growth start up, one of the fastest in the world (not hyperbole) I wish I could upvote this specific comment more: "The problem with growing as fast as Amazon has is that their talent bar couldn’t keep up. I can’t imagine this design being okay 10 years ago when I was there."

I came to the realization about a year ago, that there are definitely talent tiers and unless you are working super hard at recruiting and paying top dollar, the cliff edge approaches fast and is very very steep.