Amazon Career Choice Case Study

CONTEXT

At the core of its mission, Amazon believes in providing all employees with opportunities to learn new skills and advance their careers. In 2012, the company introduced Career Choice, an education and training benefit designed to help eligible hourly employees acquire new skills and create pathways to careers in high-demand roles.

This initiative is particularly beneficial for frontline workers, who often face challenges such as limited career paths, inflexible scheduling, and physically demanding tasks, resulting in high turnover rates. By offering top-notch skills training, the Career Choice program not only empowers its 700,000+ eligible hourly employees globally with better career prospects but also helps reduce turnover and cultivates a more committed workforce.

GOALS

Since 2021, the Career Choice team has been partnering with Correlation One to develop and roll out customized technical training programs across the following areas:

Data Analytics
Supply Chain & Logistics
Data Center & Operations
Computer Support
Software Development
Salesforce Administration
Cloud Support Operations
Cybersecurity

These technical tracks aim to equip Amazonʼs hourly employees with sought-after skills, enabling them to fill data and digital roles within the company and the broader AWS ecosystem.

CORRELATION ONE’S SOLUTION

Correlation Oneʼs training solution is designed to help Amazon Associates secure in-demand, higher skilled, technical roles within Amazon and its partner ecosystem. As a result, it is structured to support both the Associatesʼ learning and development objectives and the recruiting and retention needs of Amazon and its partners.

For employees, our programs foster engagement and subject matter mastery, leading to industry-leading completion rates and NPS scores.
For Amazon, our programs are scalable, highly customizable, and easy to implement. We also provide benchmarking reports which help employers compare the technical skills of their employees with those of their industry peers.

New cohorts are run every three months and are each made up of hundreds of employees. Correlation One offers eight training tracks across a variety of technical domains including data analytics, cybersecurity, IT support and more. These tracks provide choice and opportunity to Amazonʼs employees as they work to advance their careers by obtaining in-demand skills while also supporting Amazonʼs talent needs. Training tracks typically last up to 16 weeks and combine live, instructor-led training with asynchronous studies as well as career development coaching.

Mahmuda Sarker
Amazon

"The most helpful aspect of the program for me was the community I had access to. When I needed help or access to resources, I could call upon my Instructors, TAs, and Professional Development Coach 24/7. "

Christian Martinez
U.S. Army

"I truly loved the career development [support]. We got one-on-one meetings with the TAs. We got one-on-one meetings with the teachers. That was probably my favorite part of the whole program. "