Dive Brief:

• Amazon's founder and chief executive, Jeff Bezos, outwardly defended his company's corporate culture, though he ignored specifics from a critical report by The New York Times last year, according to Reuters and other media outlets.
• "The reason cultures are so stable in time is because people self-select," Bezos wrote in the annual letter to shareholders. "Someone energized by competitive zeal may select and be happy in one culture, while someone who loves to pioneer and invent may choose another," he wrote, adding that Amazon has never declared that its approach is the "right one."
• In its investigation, which tooks months, the Times painted Amazon as a brutal, highly competitive corporate culture that shed workers after harsh evaluations by both co-workers and managers. Amazon, at the time, denied the allegations in a blog post and other outlets.

Dive Insight:

The debate over Amazon's culture no doubt will continue, but there have been signs that the massive retailer may be shifting slightly to meet the criticisms leveled by ex-employees and highlighted in the Times article.

However, Amazon did retain it's #1 ranking in the recent Harris Reputation Quotient Summary Report.