Courtesy of Sylvania Harrod
- Sylvania Harrod transitioned from Big Tech to private equity by leveraging his tech experience.
- Harrod's career spanned roles at Amazon, Cisco, Dell, and others, and each had both pros and cons.
- Amazon's culture and entrepreneurial spirit were career highlights, despite some lacking benefits.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Sylvania Harrod, a 39-year-old former Big Tech employee who now works in private equity in Virginia. This story has been edited for length and clarity.
I didn't go to college. I joined the Army at 18 and served for nearly five years.
After I got out, I worked the front desk at a gym. I kept seeing a group of guys who wore nice clothes and drove nice cars. I asked them what they did for work, and they told me they worked for CDW.
Even though I had no experience working in tech, they helped me get hired in tech sales. I went to work for CDW in 2008.
I would continue my career at companies like Amazon, HPE, Cisco, and Dell. Each had pros and cons.
I left CDW to work for SHI International Corp., and then Dell
I worked for SHI International Corp. for one year. As a result of my experience in the roles at CDW and SHI, I was hired as a sales manager at Dell.
Dell supported going back and getting your degree. It also had different mentorship groups to learn about public speaking and leadership development, especially for veterans.
The headquarters in Round Rock, Texas, had all the major perks, such as lunches, snacks, and great offices, but I worked in one of their ancillary offices outside Washington, D.C., so I didn't get to experience those perks. I worked for Dell until 2016.
After Dell, I went to work for a company called Nimble Storage
A week after I started, HPE acquired Nimble. HPE gave me a car perk, great lunches, and tuition reimbursement.
After HPE, I went to work for Cisco in 2018. The best benefit at Cisco was our global sales kickoff every year in Las Vegas, during which our company shut down most of Vegas for our 20,000 staff members.
The cool perks were things like the ability to get more technical certifications — Cisco has a very extensive training curriculum. They also had sales trainers come in and train us.
Although Cisco didn't have the typical perks of other Big Tech companies, it had an amazing paternity and adoption program. Cisco gave you three weeks (outside your normal leave) to bond with your child.
Cisco also had the best performance incentives for sales reps' compensation I've ever seen.
I worked for Cisco until January 2019 and left to work for Commvault
I moved to Denver with my family and went to one of Cisco's partners, Commvault, a backup data protection company. While living in Denver, I contracted Lyme disease, and we moved back to the D.C. area in 2020.
I needed a year to recover, and Commvault was very gracious, allowing me to have all the medical recovery time I needed.
Amazon announced it was building a second HQ in the D.C. area
I was talking to colleagues I worked with at Cisco and Dell, and they suggested I apply to work at Amazon. Once I healed enough to work again, I went through the long, strenuous interview process.
The first step is to talk to a recruiter. The second stage is to speak to somebody in sales. Every interviewer asks questions associated with Amazon's 16 leadership principles.
After you go through that phase, you go through a process called a loop — a series of six interviews that you do on the same day. You have to tell a unique story for each leadership principle.
One of the individuals in the loop is called a bar raiser. Their job is to ensure there are no unconscious biases in the interview process. The bar raiser comes from a completely different department — my bar raiser was one of the project managers for the Amazon recycling program.
If one person finds anything challenging, they can put their thumbs down and say they don't vote for you joining the Amazon culture.
I was hired at Amazon in November 2021
I became an account manager at Amazon. This was the first time in my career that I didn't sell technology — I sold a vision. I understood a client's vision, and then I would bring product market experts to help them define it, figure out how to build it, and ensure that it would hit their destinations.
30% of my time was spent working with partners, preparing for different customer meetings, and having internal calls. Another 20% was spent bettering the AWS organization through mentorship programs.
I worked in person in Arlington, Virginia, or on a customer site, but I could also work from home.
Amazon's second headquarters in Arlington is beautiful
There are multiple cuisine styles and restaurants with vegetarian, meat, and clean food options. There was also a game room, walkable gardens, quiet rooms, and a painting studio. I did cool arts and crafts with customers.
The building features solar panels on the rooftop and has gyms, bicycle parking, bicycle repair shops, and EV parking spaces with free charging.
Amazon is a dog-first culture — they have a dog run inside the building that's open to the public. There's just an aura when you're there, and it made me more productive.
Some benefits at Amazon were lacking
Things like 401(k) matching and health insurance were not as great as at other companies I worked for. One of the leadership principles is frugality. However, they did have the best employee resource groups.
If you can prove with data that something is true, they will implement a program for you. They allocated $1M to a program that gives free certifications to students at HBCUs and from marginalized areas.
They also give you credits of up to $20,000, are willing to pay to help you through the adoption process, and give you paid leave.
I stayed at Amazon until 2024, when I decided to go into private equity
Working in Big Tech is great if you have the personality fit, and I definitely have that personality. It also depends on which team you work on. I suggest working on growing teams.
While there, I realized that 90% of my customers were served by private equity. This realization made me realize my true desire was to work in PE. I drive most portfolio companies to work with the Amazon team, so I still work with the same teams on a different side of the fence.
Amazon has been my favorite place to work
My least favorite place to work was Dell, because it felt like a churn-and-burn factory.
The best place I worked was Amazon AWS because it was the most entrepreneurial place I'd ever worked. Every day, you were presented with unorthodox challenges internally and externally.
I wouldn't be able to do the things I do now at the level I'm at without AWS.