What are Amazon's Leadership Principles?

Amazon's Leadership Principles are 16 core values that guide decision-making and hiring at Amazon. They include Customer Obsession, Ownership, Invent and Simplify, Are Right A Lot, Learn and Be Curious, Hire and Develop the Best, Insist on the Highest Standards, Think Big, Bias for Action, Frugality, Earn Trust, Dive Deep, Have Backbone; Disagree and Commit, Deliver Results, Strive to be Earth's Best Employer, and Success and Scale Bring Broad Responsibility.

How many interview rounds does Amazon have?

Amazon's interview process typically consists of 5 rounds: a phone screen (45 minutes), followed by a virtual or onsite loop of 4-5 interviews including a Bar Raiser interview. The entire process usually takes 4-6 weeks from initial application to offer.

What is a Bar Raiser interview at Amazon?

A Bar Raiser is a specially trained Amazon interviewer from outside the hiring team who ensures hiring standards remain high. They have veto power over hiring decisions and focus on long-term thinking and cultural fit. The Bar Raiser evaluates whether a candidate will raise the overall talent bar at Amazon.

How should I prepare for Amazon behavioral interviews?

Prepare 8-10 detailed stories that demonstrate Amazon's Leadership Principles using the STAR method (Situation, Task, Action, Result). Focus on quantifying your impact with metrics, use 'I' instead of 'we' to show your personal contribution, and be ready for deep follow-up questions about your decision-making process.

Which Amazon Leadership Principles come up most often?

While all 16 Leadership Principles matter, Ownership, Customer Obsession, Deliver Results, and Bias for Action appear frequently in interviews. However, different roles emphasize different principles—technical roles may focus more on Dive Deep and Invent and Simplify, while management roles emphasize Hire and Develop the Best.

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Amazon Interview Guide

Leadership PrinciplesOfficial

All Levels

16 Principles

15-20 min read

Practice Available

What Makes Amazon Interviews Different

Amazon's behavioral interviews are the most structured in Big Tech. Every question maps directly to one of 16 Leadership Principles, and interviewers are trained to "peel the onion"—probing deeply into a single story for up to 20 minutes. Where Google evaluates holistically, Amazon wants granular evidence (data, dates, specific actions) that you have lived their principles. The process is famously rigorous. For senior roles (L6+), you may even be asked to provide a written narrative, testing your ability to communicate in Amazon's document-centric culture. But the biggest differentiator is the Bar Raiser: an interviewer with veto power whose sole job is to ensure you raise the performance average of the current team.

The Bar Raiser Interview

What it is:

The Bar Raiser is Amazon's secret weapon for hiring quality. One interviewer in your loop (typically from outside the hiring team) is a certified Bar Raiser with veto power. Their role is not to fill the position, but to protect the company culture.

Who they are:

Bar Raisers are experienced Amazonians (typically L6+) who undergo extensive training. They are neutral third parties who ensure candidates are better than 50% of the current employees in the role.

What they look for:

Consistency: Do your stories align with what you told others?
Depth: They will ask "Why?" 5+ times on a single detail.
Ownership: They probe "We" statements until they find your specific contribution.
Coachability: How do you respond when your data is challenged?
Bar Raising Potential: Do you bring a superpower the team currently lacks?

Tips:

Prepare for 30+ minutes on a single story.
Know your metrics cold (revenue, latency, time saved).
Do not get defensive if they seem skeptical—that is their job.
Treat this interviewer as the most critical one of the loop.
They often test "Earn Trust" and "Have Backbone" by challenging your decisions.

Amazon's Leadership Principles

Customer Obsession

Foundational

Leaders start with the customer and work backwards. They work vigorously to earn and keep customer trust. Although leaders pay attention to competitors, they obsess over customers.

What interviewers look for:

Working backwards: You started with customer needs, not internal constraints
Long-term thinking: You sacrificed short-term metrics for customer trust
Deep understanding: You knew your customer beyond surface-level personas
Proactive advocacy: You fought for customer interests even when unpopular
Measurable impact: You can quantify how customers benefited

Red flags:

Focusing on internal stakeholders over end users
Making decisions based primarily on competitor actions
No specific customer examples or data
Treating customer obsession as "customer service"
Unable to articulate who the customer actually was

Ownership

Critical

Leaders are owners. They think long term and don't sacrifice long-term value for short-term results. They act on behalf of the entire company, beyond just their own team. They never say "that's not my job."

What interviewers look for:

Beyond your scope: You solved problems outside your job description
Long-term thinking: You considered impacts beyond the immediate project
No finger-pointing: You took responsibility even when others shared blame
End-to-end delivery: You saw things through to completion, not just handoff
Company-level thinking: Your decisions considered broader organizational impact

Red flags:

Stopping at your team's boundary
Blaming other teams or external factors
Short-term fixes without addressing root causes
Waiting for permission to act
Optimizing for your metrics at others' expense

Bias for Action

High Velocity

Speed matters in business. Many decisions and actions are reversible and do not need extensive study. We value calculated risk taking.

What interviewers look for:

Speed with judgment: You moved fast but made smart tradeoffs
Reversible decisions: You identified what could be undone vs. what couldn't
Calculated risks: You acted despite uncertainty with mitigation plans
Unblocking yourself: You found ways forward when blocked
Iteration over perfection: You shipped and improved rather than waiting

Red flags:

Waiting for perfect information
Escalating instead of deciding
Slow execution without good reason
Risk aversion that stalled progress
No examples of moving quickly

Deliver Results

Outcome Focused

Leaders focus on the key inputs for their business and deliver them with the right quality and in a timely fashion. Despite setbacks, they rise to the occasion and never settle.

What interviewers look for:

Clear outcomes: You can state exactly what you delivered and when
Overcoming obstacles: You pushed through setbacks and blockers
Quality and speed: You balanced getting it done with getting it right
Metrics-driven: You measured success with specific data
Resilience: You adapted when initial plans failed

Red flags:

Vague outcomes ("it went well")
Giving up when faced with obstacles
Missing deadlines without learning
No quantifiable results
Blaming circumstances for failures

Earn Trust

Interpersonal

Leaders listen attentively, speak candidly, and treat others respectfully. They are vocally self-critical, even when doing so is awkward or embarrassing.

What interviewers look for:

Self-awareness: You openly acknowledged your mistakes and limitations
Candid feedback: You gave honest input even when it was uncomfortable
Active listening: You genuinely incorporated others' perspectives
Vulnerability: You admitted when you didn't know something
Building relationships: You created trust through consistent behavior

Red flags:

Never being wrong in your stories
Avoiding conflict or difficult conversations
Taking credit without sharing
Defensive responses to feedback
No examples of admitting mistakes

Dive Deep

Analytical

Leaders operate at all levels, stay connected to the details, audit frequently, and are skeptical when metrics and anecdote differ. No task is beneath them.

What interviewers look for:

Detail orientation: You knew the specifics, not just the summary
Root cause analysis: You dug past symptoms to find real issues
Hands-on involvement: You got into the weeds when needed
Data skepticism: You questioned metrics that didn't match reality
Full-stack understanding: You understood systems end-to-end

Red flags:

Surface-level answers without specifics
Delegating without understanding
Accepting data at face value
Unable to explain technical details
Staying only at the strategic level

20 Curated Practice Questions

These questions represent the most commonly tested Leadership Principles. Practice these with HireHelix to get AI-powered feedback calibrated to Amazon's evaluation criteria.

Customer Obsession

foundational

"Describe a difficult interaction you had with a customer. How did you deal with it? What was the outcome? How would you handle it differently?"

Practice

"Tell me about a time when you went above and beyond for a customer. Why did you do it? How did the customer respond? What was the outcome?"

Practice

"Give me an example of when you were able to anticipate a customer need with a solution/product they didn't know they needed/wanted yet. How did you know they needed this? How did they respond?"

Practice

"Tell me about a time when you evaluated the customer experience of your product or service. What did you do? What was the result?"

Practice

Ownership & Deliver Results

intermediate

"Tell me about a time when you took on something significant outside your area of responsibility. Why was it important? What was the outcome?"

Practice

"Describe a time when you didn't think you were going to meet a commitment you promised. How did you identify the risk and communicate it to stakeholders? Is there anything you would do differently?"

Practice

"Give me an example of a time when you were able to deliver an important project under a tight deadline. What sacrifices did you have to make to meet the deadline? How did they impact the final deliverable? What was the final outcome?"

Practice

"Tell me about a time when you had significant, unanticipated obstacles to overcome in achieving a key goal. What was the obstacle? Were you eventually successful? Knowing what you know now, is there anything you would have done differently?"

Practice

Bias for Action & Dive Deep

intermediate

"Give me an example of a calculated risk that you have taken where speed was critical. What was the situation and how did you handle it? What steps did you take to mitigate the risk? What was the outcome? Knowing what you know now, would you have done anything differently?"

Practice

"Describe a situation where you made an important business decision without consulting your manager. What was the situation and how did it turn out? Would you have done anything differently?"

Practice

"Tell me about a time when you were trying to understand a complex problem on your team and you had to dig into the details to figure it out. Who did you talk with or where did you have to look to find the most valuable information? How did you use that information to help solve the problem?"

Practice

"Tell me about a situation that required you to dig deep to get to the root cause. How did you know you were focusing on the right things? What was the outcome? Would you have done anything differently?"

Practice

Earn Trust & Have Backbone

advanced

"Tell me about a time when you had to communicate a change in direction that you anticipated people would have concerns about. What did you do to understand the concerns and mitigate them? Were there any changes you made along the way after hearing these concerns? How did you handle questions and/or resistance? Were you able to get people comfortable with the change?"

Practice

"Tell me about an experience when you let a team member down. How did this impact them in their role?"

Practice

"Describe a time when you felt really strongly about something on a project but the team decided to go in a different direction. How hard did you press the issue? How did you approach that project afterward?"

Practice

"Give me an example of when you took an unpopular stance in a meeting with peers and your leader and you were the outlier. What was it? Why did you feel strongly about it? What did you do? What was the outcome?"

Practice

Learn & Be Curious

foundational

"Tell me about a time when you realized you needed a deeper level of subject matter expertise to do your job well. What did you do about it? What was the outcome? Is there anything you would have done differently?"

Practice

"Describe a time when you took on work outside of your comfort area. How did you identify what you needed to learn to be successful? How did you go about building expertise to meet your goal? Did you meet your goal?"

Practice

"Tell me about a time when you didn't know what to do next or how to solve a challenging problem. How do you learn what you don't know? What were the options you considered? How did you decide the best path forward? What was the outcome?"

Practice

"We all have things about ourselves we'd like to improve on at work. Give me an example of something that you've worked on to improve your overall work effectiveness. What resources did you identify to help you develop? What was the impact?"

Practice

What a Strong Answer Looks Like

This example demonstrates a Customer Obsession answer with the data-driven specificity Amazon expects. Notice how every claim is backed by metrics.

Question:

"Tell me about a time when you went above and beyond for a customer."

Strong Answer Example

**Situation:** I was a product manager at [Company] managing our enterprise dashboard. In Q3, our largest customer—representing $2.4M ARR—escalated that our reporting latency made their month-end close process take 3 extra days. Their CFO was threatening to cancel. **Task:** My VP asked me to "fix the relationship," but the actual problem was technical: our batch processing ran every 6 hours, and they needed near-real-time data. Engineering had this on the roadmap for Q1—four months away. I needed to find a way to keep this customer without derailing our roadmap. **Action:** I flew to their headquarters to understand the real workflow—not just the complaint. I discovered they only needed 4 specific reports in real-time; the rest could stay batched. I proposed a two-phase solution: Phase 1 would prioritize those 4 reports in a 2-week sprint by repurposing our internal monitoring pipeline. Phase 2 would be the full real-time architecture in Q1. I negotiated with engineering to borrow two backend engineers for the sprint by showing the revenue at risk. I personally wrote the product spec in 48 hours and did daily standups with the customer's finance team to validate we were solving the right problem. When we hit a blocker on data transformation, I worked with their IT team to implement a temporary client-side cache as a bridge. **Result:** We shipped Phase 1 in 11 days. The customer's month-end close dropped from 5 days to 2—better than their original ask. They renewed for 3 years instead of 1, adding $1.2M to the contract. The real-time architecture we built became a standard feature that won us 6 more enterprise deals worth $4.3M in the next two quarters. I was promoted to Senior PM three months later, partly based on this work.

Scoring Breakdown

4.8/ 5

Situation Clarity

Action Depth

Data & Metrics

Customer Obsession

4.5

Ownership

Verdict: This answer exemplifies what Amazon looks for: specific metrics, genuine customer empathy (flew out, discovered real need), creative problem-solving within constraints, and clear business impact. The "peel the onion" follow-ups would survive because every claim is grounded in specifics.

What a Weak Answer Looks Like

Question:

"Tell me about a time when you went above and beyond for a customer."

Weak Answer Example

"We had an unhappy customer who was going to churn, so I worked really hard to fix their issues. I coordinated with the team and we eventually solved the problem. They decided to stay and were happy with the outcome."

What's wrong:

No specifics: Which customer? What revenue? What issues?
No metrics: "Worked hard" and "eventually" are unmeasurable
Team attribution: "We solved" doesn't show what YOU did
Vague outcome: "Happy" isn't a business result
No timeline: When did this happen? How long did it take?

How to fix it:

Amazon interviewers will immediately ask: "What specifically did you do?" "What was the revenue impact?" "How did you measure success?" Prepare your STAR stories with concrete numbers: revenue at risk, time invested, percentage improvements, and business outcomes. If you don't have exact figures, reasonable estimates with your methodology are better than vague language.

Common Failure Patterns We See

Based on thousands of practice sessions, these patterns consistently lead to "no hire" decisions at Amazon—even for otherwise strong candidates.

The "We" Deflector

Using "we" for everything and deflecting when asked about individual contribution. Amazon wants to know what YOU did, not what your team did.

Example:

"We identified the problem, we built the solution, we launched it successfully."

Fix:

Replace "we" with "I" where accurate. When describing team efforts, clarify: "I led the technical design, my colleague handled stakeholder communication, and I coordinated the launch."

The Metrics Vacuum

Telling stories without any quantifiable data. Amazon is famously data-driven; vague success claims don't survive scrutiny.

Example:

"It was a really successful project and everyone was happy with the results."

Fix:

Add numbers everywhere: timeline, team size, revenue impact, percentage improvement, customer count, error reduction. If you don't have exact figures, give estimates with methodology.

The Surface Skimmer

Giving high-level summaries without operational detail. Bar Raisers will drill into specifics; surface answers signal you weren't actually close to the work.

Example:

"I managed the project and made sure everything got delivered on time."

Fix:

Prepare to go 3-4 levels deep on any story. What was the specific technical challenge? How did you diagnose it? What were the tradeoffs you considered? Why did you choose that approach?

The Borrowed Story

Telling stories where you observed or advised but didn't actually do the work. Amazon probes until they find the real owner; borrowed stories collapse under questioning.

Example:

"I advised the team on strategy and they implemented my recommendations."

Fix:

Only tell stories where you had direct ownership of outcomes. If you genuinely led through influence, be specific about how: what meetings you ran, what documents you wrote, what decisions you made.

The Perfect Record

Never admitting mistakes or failures. Amazon explicitly values "Earn Trust" and "Learn and Be Curious"—both require vulnerability and self-awareness.

Example:

"In the end, my approach was validated and the skeptics came around."

Fix:

Prepare at least two stories where you were wrong, failed, or received critical feedback. What did you learn? What would you do differently? These stories often score higher than success stories.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the "Writing Exercise" I've heard about?

For senior roles (typically L6+), Amazon often requires a written document (1-2 pages) responding to a prompt like "Describe your most significant professional achievement." This tests your written communication skills, which are critical in Amazon's document-based culture (no PowerPoints allowed).

How many Leadership Principles will I be tested on?

Typically 4-6 principles per interview, with each interviewer assigned specific LPs to evaluate. In a full loop, you'll cover 12-14 unique principles. "Customer Obsession" and "Ownership" almost always appear multiple times.

How long should my answers be?

Amazon officially recommends spending about 20 minutes per story loop. This doesn't mean a 20-minute monologue; it means a 5-7 minute initial STAR response followed by 10-15 minutes of deep follow-up questions from the interviewer. Depth is key.

How is the Bar Raiser interview different?

The Bar Raiser is typically the most challenging interview because they're trained to dig deeper and aren't invested in filling the role. Expect 30+ minutes on a single story with 10+ follow-up questions. They look for consistency across your answers and coachability.

What if I don't have senior-level stories?

Amazon evaluates you against the level you're interviewing for. Focus on stories where you demonstrated leadership behaviors regardless of title: influencing without authority, taking ownership beyond your scope, diving deep into problems.