Amazon Looks to Hire 50K New Employees

More than ever, a shopping trip means sitting on the couch and clicking a few buttons instead of making the trek to the nearest mall. For every shopping cart click, there's someone on the other end to make sure that the purchase gets packed and shipped correctly. Companies that sell online must have the manpower to make the logistics work quickly and accurately.

Perhaps the most notable of online retail companies is powerhouse Amazon.com Inc. Amazon is responding to the business boon with a push to add large numbers to their workforce. The Seattle-based tech company hopes to add as many as 50,000 employees at its American fulfillment operations centers. Amazon hopes that 80 percent of these new employees will work full time.

With so many new employees to recruit, Amazon is hosting what it calls Amazon Jobs Day. They've planned recruiting events at 10 of their fulfillment locations across the United States where the new employees would work. Amazon leadership hopes the event can help potential applicants learn about what life is like as an Amazon employee. Company representatives hope to provide information about available jobs and make job offers to qualified applicants. The company says that they hope and expect recruiting events to bring a surge to their workforce.

There are jobs available for both team members and leadership. The exact number of each job type varies by location. The company also wants to hire human resource managers, team leaders to oversee operations, information technology professionals and other specialized, skilled employees.

Amazon says that their benefits package is competitive. They say full-time employees are eligible for attractive benefits that include disability insurance, health insurance and stock options. Officials say pay is competitive. In addition, they offer retirement savings plans.

In addition to this current jobs push, Amazon says they'll add at least 100,000 employees for full-time work over the next year. Total, that would give the company more than 280,000 employees just in the United States. The company says the push for employees comes as their sales grow and because the company wants to diversify its operations to remain competitive.

In addition to hiring in its service centers, they also plan to add to their workforce in customer service, software development and data analytics. They say they plan to expand across the United States and the entire world. Their global workforce is growing quickly. At more than 350,000 employees in April, 2017, Amazon's workforce is up 43 percent from its 2016 numbers. They're also hiring at a much faster rate than competitors like Google and Microsoft.

Not only is the company growing at its Seattle headquarters, they're also growing in the southern United States and in the Midwest. They say they've spread their expansion efforts out across the country as part of a planned, strategic effort to work efficiently and ship orders to customers across the country as quickly as possible.

Amazon CFO Brian Olsavsky says the big hiring push is in response to increased business activity in its fulfillment centers. They say the hiring effort is part of their larger goal to stay the world leader in online retail sales. They say they want to remain not only competitive but also dominant in the industry. In addition to its current fulfillment centers across the country, Amazon hopes to build even more fulfillment centers.

The company's growth has helped the City of Seattle become one of the fastest growing cities for software development jobs in the United States according to Glassdoor. Glassdoor says that the online retail industry is picking up more new software engineers than other industries. They say Amazon alone is responsible for a large share of those numbers.

When applicants attend a jobs event, they should adhere to the dress code. They say would-be employees should dress appropriately in order to demonstrate that they're able to comply with the dress code requirement if they're hired. That includes making sure that hair longer than shoulder length is tied back.

All applicants should wear closed shoes. While beards are allowed, they should be trimmed and neat. Jewelry is not allowed. Company representatives say that qualified applicants can walk into a recruiting event, complete an application and walk out with a new job. They say potential hires should be prepared to demonstrate eligibility to work in the United States.